Chronicles of Octopon
by ridt
Summary: Ren and his comrades must face dangers while in pursuit of the Thirteen Treasures of Rule and fighting arch nemesis Bloth across the twenty seas. However, they will soon discover the secrets of their circumstance, which are closely interlocked to reveal a darker and deeper truth.
1. Prologue

Ioz rolled to evade a further attack from the relentless machete as Mantus drew it diagonally, he saw the wretched and victorious snarl crossing the haggard face of the opponent. His vision started to spin, he descried two flint-tufted commanders about to deal him a finishing blow with a spotless and verily clean slicer. He heard that leviathan, that gelid eel blustering a laugh of jubilation. The Pirate King seemed to be talking to his second-in-command, dispensing encouragement and words of praise to the worm. The sick master prolonged in spiel, taking pleasure in his final moments. "By my sword...I won't let you..." The nigh-throttled swashbuckler mustered the stamina to say. 'Really, Ioz. I remember him screaming for another chance. Finish him, Mantus.' Ioz heard the vague and crooning derision emit some scorn of what his ears imagined. Rowdy howls and chants rampantly followed. He arduously steeled his sword in front of his chest and reached for the spiral jewel.

Mandatory Disclaimer: Pirates of Dark Water is property of its respective owners, all character likenesses are coincidental. I make no profit off typing fanfiction, please do not sue me, for I 'm but a poor 'lass. I obtained much of my information and resources for this story from piratesofdarkwaternet. Original characters are property of myself, please ask permission for use.

DARK WATER:

Chronicles of Octopon

Ren and his comrades must face dangers while in pursuit of the Thirteen Treasures of Rule and fighting arch nemesis Bloth across the twenty seas. However, they will soon discover the secrets of their circumstance, which are closely interlocked to reveal a darker and deeper truth.

~ Prologue to The Dark Saga, the Continuity of the Search for Octopon's Treasures of Rule is intended to take place One year immediately after the start of Prince Ren's Quest. We Finish the Tale of the Crew's voyage on the Wraith ~

"Mi'liege, I mean no disrespect but we're forty leagues off-course...! If it continues, I'm not sure if I can..." Rodden assessed the state of the riggings on a galleon bound for the island known as Biperia. His captain took a careful detour along the lightning coast to avoid an otherwise suicide-mission.

"You kreld-eater! Why do you challenge Captain Badeout's authority?!" Whirled the rage of Teng, the loyalist of Badeout's crew, as he wound into a temper that could only be increased by the poor stock. The implacable punch bruised Rodden in the face unexpectedly.

"No, Teng, Rodden is right. We are off-course, until the next monsoon's drift I'll have her forty points off the sea of Kalinda and we'll find port for these salt sacks." Beside the quarrel, Badeout reprimanded Teng as he hadn't since the uprising on Andorus. He bent nerve to a more taxing matter as his lips mildly pursed. Grumbles from Teng above clobbered over the deck as the Wasp was being trimmed from fore to aft.

"Galdebar's Reef! The Eyes of the Fallen Captain!" Every man who sailed days aboard the Wasp as their only haven drew gasps.

"Ignore it, it's an illusion designed to throw us off. All hands on deck, I want to arrive at Port Flaiken in Kalinda by next Morn's Sun." Captain Badeout paid no mind to the image amongst the dampened clouds and sternly fastened his orders on the petrified legion of his charge. Two flaring irises of blood-red slitted between a canvas of evening gloom. When the fires in the heaven opened over the stern, the crew of the Wasp heard the final sound of her hull gouging a formation of coral. Death loomed over all and as the ship sunk, a log recording the markings of a dangerous isle was set awash.

Over a crest of spikes, a magician took a bow.

The skies of Merr were clear as two large crescent moons were visible on the horizon. The mid-morning sun poured over the water in a orange-yellow glow as the Wraith steadily made course from the shores of Octopon.

"I wonder how the 8th Treasure became alive on its own." Ren mused outloud on his thoughts as Tula stood beside him, gazing out into the distance. His eyes were intent on a glowing relic he retained in his hand, he quelled his perception by fooling with the Compass around his neck. It appeared to be pointing South, but he was not clear of the location. He stood contemplative, still thinking of their previous escape on Delpha and the finding of the first sentient Treasure they had encountered. "Huh?" He jolted out of it. Suddenly the ship rocked unsteadily and he needed to catch himself against falling into the railing.

"Who knows Ren, but it seems like we have more adventures ahead of us." Tula yelled in response to Ren as she strode to adjust the sail.

"Noy jitat! The water is getting hard to maneuver. Are you done with that sail, woman? Must I do every labor on this ship?" Ioz shouted to his colleague from the wheel. It became more difficult to steer through the waves. "Tula?" He called her name.

"I'd be done faster Ioz, if I could finish what I'm doing...There." Tula got her words out through tense stops as she finished with the riggings and skipped down from the line. She seemed irritated, but she could not help but smile that Ioz had corrected his error. He may have even learned something from their previous venture.

"Ren, do you know which direction the Compass is pointing?" Ioz hollered an inquiry to Ren on deck as he spun the wheel, turning the Wraith out of the turbulent water. It moved forward with the push of the breeze.

"South!" Ren shouted back, seeking up from where he was standing. He would have to right himself back up after his slip, thanks to a shake from the Wraith's bow.

"No change in direction then." Ioz stated barely above a whisper. His full concentration was now on steering, the craft blew out from the difficult current.

"Hey! What was that? You almost made me fall out of bed!" Enunciated a grumpy monkeybird's voice from the sleeping cabin.

"Good to see you're finally awake Niddler." Ren greeted and smiled as he twisted to face his brightly plumed companion. Sounds from a thump of lazy feet hitting the floor and a swoop, a noise of rustling feathers followed.

"I can't help it! Flying you both around has gotten me beat, and I was having a really good dream too..." Niddler whined but he accompanied Ren, who now stood at the side of the quarters.

"It's okay Niddler." Ren reassured his friend and grinned. He composed a steady chuckle as he patted Niddler on the head.

"Ren..." Tula began as she tread up to the prince and his best buddy. "I know we're going South but where are we headed exactly? There really are not a lot of resources on this course." The ecomancer questioned as she joined Ren in leaning against the lodging to his right. "Ioz wants to know because the trade route we're on will leave us dry unless we find a checkpoint to take refuge." She could do no more to emphatically analyze Ren's motives, her eyes shifting toward the reluctant pirate.

"We have to go wherever the Compass points." Quite frankly Ren allot his will. He held the Compass in his hand, which seemed to signal it to shoot out a beam...Indeed Southbound. "I guess we'll just find out where it leads, we have to get there before Bloth makes headway on us." Ren paused to regulate himself, his crew put some distance between themselves and the Maelstrom, but he now wondered just how far it had trailed behind them. He took a gander over the bulwark and saw nothing in the scope.

"Ren, is it pointing to Kalinda? Because that's where we're going to be headed unless you tell me otherwise." Ioz hollered out, not wanting to leave the wheel. There was no response. "Ren!" The invoke of the buccaneer called again to jar his captain back into reality.

For a few moments, Ren was lost in space. "Oh! Uh, no. It isn't, but I can't tell where it's pointing to right now." Ren managed to get out as he squinted his searching eyes in the direction of the beam. Something was off.

"Chungo lungo." Ioz muttered inaudibly. "Then we're going to have to go there anyway." He silently expressed to himself.

"Ren, what's wrong?" Tula quizzically inspected the leader of the group, eying him with concern. She sensed something from Ren.

"Oh, nothing. That's fine, Ioz." Ren did not say it but for some reason, he struggled with a very bad feeling that he could not place. He did not know where the Compass pointed, but the direction did not appear familiar to him at all. At least, not that he could remember. They were on the way to find the 9th Treasure, but something felt uncanny. It might be a good idea to stop in Kalinda for supplies anyway.

Ioz shouted an approval, but by the time he did, he would be shocked out of it. "By the twin moons! Chungo lungo!" The man's horrified expletive struck out, causing the other two adventurers on the Wraith to snap heads to his direction.

"Ioz?" Ren yelled back, stun and trepidation growing in his awareness.

"I can't move the ship at al-" Ioz was cut off by the barrage of dagrons that were swooping down upon them. It had only taken a moment, but no more was needed for all three of them to be immobilized and carted off. Try as they did, fighting became useless in the situation. The loyal crew knew where they would be heading.

Ren and Ioz awoke from the daze of being carried and sure enough, their hands were bound. The scenery around them echoed of bones and treachery. All three of them would be surrounded by a small army of scavengers who were grinning toothless and grisly smiles. Ren mustered a frustrated glare, his teal eyes fluttered open with anger and agitation. He focused his stare on the figure that caused the sea of the hairy onlookers to part.

"Thought you could escape me, eh, Son of Primus?" The malevolent welcome of a hellion boasted as he towered over the dwarfed captive, the only working eye of gold peered at Ren with the greatest of malice. "So nice of you to deliver this to me, along with your presence, prince." His odium berating, as he reached over and ripped the aquamarine jewel from the foolhardy boy's neck. His lips twisted into a triumphant smile.

Ren glared with disgust. Although the eloquent yet malicious spiel could make him reel, it was not half as bad as having to see the tormenting oaf. Ren gritted his teeth with hostility at his attacker. "You won't get away with it, naja-dog!" Ren's frustrated words met the enemy. He fought bonds, but stood unfortunately very powerless against the surrounding oodles of thieves.

"Ah, but I already have, boy. With your generous contribution, I'll be able to find the rest of the Treasures and then your kind will be as no more, under my reign." With a puffed-out victory, the growl of the humanoid cruelly mocked Ren. He leaned closer to gloat at the trapped noble, tipping a laugh toward his victims. "And now I'll show you the penalty for your insolence!" Bloth glared at the opposer who would now be out of his way for good. He dug claws into the youth's shoulder, pulling closer to the broad and open pit concealed from behind.

"You must be worried, Bloth. To do this so quickly." Ren bit as he compelled his words out. He battled, trying to squirm out of the fettering rope but the jeering crewmen behind him were pushing the three fast to their impending deaths. So this was it, all were going to die. The Quest would end after coming all this way, the one oblivion he could not stop but could not accept it. He pelted his feet out by their heels to resist the shove forward, but he would soon run out of force behind his momentum.

"No, Ren!" Tula gravely shouted, feeling deeply the pain for her friend and brave captain. She too felt herself propelled toward the quadrate hole in the center of the massive ship. She withstood as much as she could muster, but she could not manage to jostle herself free or clutch her weapon.

"So long, Son of Primus." Bloth's face wrenched as he chuckled with an evil savor of the moment, his words dripping with stabbing hatred of the boy's name.

"Noy jitat." Under his breath, Ioz swore. "You kreld-eating sea-slug..." Ioz directed at the fearsome Pirate Lord, ire burning in his dusky eyes. He was about to accept his fate, prior to abruptly realizing Bloth had made a mistake in aggrandizement and a bad one at that. Possibly the worst one that could have been made. His smirk passed to one of smugness as his mind raced with revel. This then caused Bloth to catch on, the destructive warlord's brow raised in comprehension. The miscreant silenced his braggart, just a little too late. "Thanks for the offer Captain, but I think you make better Constrictus food than I do!" Ioz clamored out, jumping out in a forward-flying kick that connected with the merciless pillager's gargantuan belly. He was not nearly strong enough to do any harm with that revolt, but it had been enough to knock the adversary off-balance and into the Constrictus pit. Bloth's vicious smile replaced with one of dread as he tried to hold an arm's length above the bottomless shaft, but it failed. However, the evil Pirate King had not lost grip on Ren's shoulder, and succeeded at dragging the boy in with him. "Noy jitat! Ren!" Ioz rued with a shout, struggling to burst free of the binding rope and cursing his hastiness. He scanned back around at the bevy of dirty onlookers, who were now becoming loud with jeering and bloodlust. Ioz only procured an instant of stagnation before he was clout into the chasm by some vengeful seadog.

"Ioz!" Tula screamed in an aghast grief when she saw him fade. One of the surrounding blades struck at her, but she spun around and turned her tied hands against the attacker's edge. The ropes fell off of her, allowing her to go free. She accomplished an airborne kick at a few of the pirates, empowering her to find a way through the horde. She whipped away from a frisk to dash like the air, weaving through the crowd and narrowly avoiding the metal.

"Ioz! Ren!" Grew a timid voice that cawed from the sky. By the time Niddler caught up with the dagron-riders, it had been too late.

"Nice of you to join us, monkeybird!" Ioz's perturbed reply rang from the pit below.

"I'll get you out!" Niddler screeched as he made an attempt to dive down, but he was driven-off by several weapons that went flying in his direction. He let out a squawk, forced stay at a distance.

"Ay jitata!" In haste Ren cursed. Loosing his balance had caused Bloth to let go of him shortly after they both fell into the slough. For less than a moment and no more than that, it was quiet. Bloth had landed face down in the water and just tried the strength to get up as the giant beast, the Constrictus, awoke from its slumber, awaiting a tasty meal for four mouths. It craned into a wobble, roaring and shrieking. Bloth was laying flat on the head of the beast, the malevolent pirate's stammers jarring full of fright as the monstrosity swayed from the side to every angle, trying to shake him.

"Chungo lungo, Ren! By Kuunda, we're getting the raffendi out of here!" Ioz howled and snatched Ren's wrist, pulling him to a tunnel that connected with the bowels of the ship.

In a flash of pink, Tula splashed in the murky water with a shrill after being thrown from the deck above and ruined the team's headstart. "Tula!" Ren yelled toward his friend and fellow-shipmate, pulling against Ioz's constraint.

"Tula! I'll get you out!" Niddler warbled from above the gully before being immediately chased away by a pirate's sword.

Tula searched overhead, pausing only for an instant before hassling to Ren who grasped her hand. The Constrictus trounced and drove itself into the wall, howling angrily and almost succeeding in ejecting Bloth. Finally it did, and the beast-of-a-captain dropped right under the exit to the sewerways. The man-eating grub violently racketed, sensing the location of it's meat.

"Come on Ren!" Ioz hastily summoned the adolescent, who was behind him. The three of them took off with Bloth closely tailing, who groaned fearstruck at the monster. The four of them ran as deftly as the water would allow, to duck and distract the beast through the endless waterways. They narrowly stayed ahead of the bloodsucker and at last reached the deep part of the kravidorm, the eradicating leech following in tow. Bloth had soared ahead of them with grandeur stomps and swerved off into a side passage.

"This way!" Ren beckoned to the pursuit of his foe. Ioz captured a nearby wooden board and threw it at the monster, which would only slow it down. Then he bounded after his deckmates. "Come on Tula!" Ren affixed Tula's hand, helping her limber over the steep slope of the tunnelway.

The deck of the Maelstrom was alive with activity from the many bandits of Bloth's crew, who leaned over the opening to the pit, listening to noises in fascination. Off to the side a voice like the snakes slurred from a deformed creature with a tentacle arm, who monitored the sea on the clouding-over horizon. The wind picked up quickly. The being pressed focus toward the water as if engrossed. "Bloth...this can't be. It's coming now." Morpho arrested the bubbling communicator around his neck, speaking into it or to it. "The dark water...Master." The man-cretin hissed.

The wiry lifeform who guarded the area and settled next to Morpho drafted a troubled glance. "What are you going on about, you slime-brain?" Bloth's second-in-command, Mantus, curtly perused as he raised a cunning eyebrow. He was a footstep away from the sea-hybrid with the likeness of a demon, along with countless others of the Captain's crew. Morpho continued to stare to the frontiers in silence.

Bloth was all but in the lead, seeming to know his destination. He jumped down into a hidden fissure within the recesses, shooting a nasty glare back at his enemies. Ren and the Wraith's faction promptly trailed. All the escapees were indolent and still as the Constrictus roared and then slithered way through another consecutive abscess. It had been no longer than when the fracas completely hushed that Ren took his prerogative. "Give back the Compass, you dartha-eel!" The prince bitterly demanded, drawing his concealed and jagged half-sword. He pointed for the aggressor.

"Try to take it from me, jitata boy!" Bloth clattered as he drew his hefty razor, the sharp edge threatening to take down anything in path of oblivion.

"You're outnumbered, kreld-eater!" Ioz resiliently growled, ready to fight as he too ripped out his blade. He assumed a combat stance, at the ready.

"You'll have to take all of us!" Tula challenged and loosened her cutlass, scowling at the enemy with a fierce determination.

"So this is how it ends, Son of Primus, with you and your friends meeting your end inside my ship!" Bloth bellowed at his competition, harshly staring them down. He raised his weapon, prepared to strike.

"Except that won't be happening." Ren vaulted up off the ground, his short steel contending against Bloth's. He could not hold the weapon off for long before the kreld-eater would charge again and lop the sword out of his hand, having an opening on him. He just needed a distraction. Ren spun away, letting the weight of his enemy's brunt topple the arms to the ground. Then he sent a punch to the crumbling villain's face. He fell just short of being able to hook the Compass. "Noy jitat!" He cursed of trammelled terror. Before Bloth could boast about his failure, Ioz annexed a blow to the lateral while Tula used her agility to flip off from the fringe and loop the Compass in the last moment. The bloated man yet again lost his balance and tumbled backward with a moan.

"Nice catch Tula, now let's get out of here!" Ren hollered to his company as he vamoosed to exit the crevice. He desisted when a tremor waved through the corridor.

"Chungo lungo, by Kuunda what was that?" Ioz staggered with an exclamation, his ebony eyes broad. Bloth had not gotten to his feet but was sitting up, stunned by the recent shift that felt like a quake.

Topside, the tide around the large ship moved heavy. Waves crashed against the hull and objects began to tilt.

"The prophecy must be fulfilled, my Master of the dark water!" Morpho stretched his feeler out to the incoming shower. The malignant current beat against the girth of the Maelstrom, causing the colossal floater to cavort from verge to brim. The sky had wanned all but totally black, not even the Compass of Rule would likely be able to shine through the mud-thick and unimpeachable clouds. In the purview, dark water crept nearer to the ship, yet too far away for anyone to have noticed.

"Stop this sorcery at once!" Mantus's wide-eyed expression grew into one stupefied and disturbed as he drew his sword at the fanatical dark disciple. Morpho simply yawed toward the commander, ogling with an exhilarated stare. The freak's arm and one tentacle raised against the sky, wiggling without control. Morpho hissed and turned back to the ocean. Mantus, decidedly and supremely freaked-out to a pinnacle, backed up slowly as he and the other pirates tried to keep their sealegs on the moving terrace. The enormous vessel creaked as it bludgeoned to stay afloat.

"This doesn't look good!" Niddler whined to himself, worried and rampant. He flew about the altitude of the Maelstrom in a panic, keeping distance away from Morpho but trying to find a way to his friends. He fluttered down, landing on the deck where there sat a small manhole connecting to the sewer. "Ren? Are you in there?" The monkeybird conjured, sticking his bobbed head into the spindly opening. His stomach grumbled, if not from hunger, than from anxiety. "I wish I could eat something right now..." He whimpered a solo woe, retracting his head back up after not hearing a response.

"Get monkeybird!" The grit of a scoundrel yelled out and some sharp projectiles buzzed in Niddler's direction, he bungled off with a frightened squawk.

Down below in the hazardous trenches, the upheaval echoed substantially. Three heroes made their trek through dank pathways.

"We have to get out of here." Ren perilously stammered, rattled within the vitriolic swamp. The trio had mounted to a standing and swaggered for the exit of the duct, which would take them to the outside.

"Not so fast, boy!" Bloth prevailed in close pursuit, the Constrictus gnashed in impending breadth. It was flowing back through the channel, eventually threatening to catch up with them.

Ren felt an encumbering hand attach around his arm. The barbaric cutthroat managed to catch the prince by the sandy hair to use him as a shield against the Constrictus, which was now in chomping range. "Scot pango! Let me go...kreld-eater!" Ren struggled but could not manage to free himself from the Pirate Lord's duress. Bloth laughed wickedly, again reaching for the Compass.

"No you don't!" Ioz bristled in to cover Ren over the trench. He dauntlessly shuffled back a length to hit Bloth's foot with the blunt flat of his sword, which caused the raider to release his colleague. The diabolical glutton muttered a curse as pain swelled into the oversized limb.

"Thanks for buying us time, Bloth." Ren teased his rival as he speedily zoomed to catch up. He heard the nasty ox sorely groan in the chasm, but still in tight pursuit. "It's this way!" Ren uncertainly declared, scouring upward at the chimney to the sewer. He hopped to latch to a chain that dangled down and immediately started to climb it to the top, his shipmates tailed. The interior structure swooned wildly.

"Chungo lungo!" Ioz growled as a sore landshark, almost losing his hold on the chain, which would have made him fall an injuring range below.

"Ay jitata! I hope when we get out of here we'll still have a ship to sail on." Tula murmured in an anxiously low tune, ascending slightly ahead of Ren and Ioz.

Upon the top-tier, groans rushed. The storm began to intensify, as one shape in the cluster was transfixed.

"Morpho, if you don't stop this treachery, you'll sink the entire ship!" The calculating but fearful grunt of the wispy blademaster addressed the insane fanatic. Mantus's swelling blues caught on the wayward practitioner with dread. The mutated half-human apparently knew no regard for the assumed destruction. Yet, he would be afraid to attack the demon with it being hard enough just to enclose his footing. Even if he could, he would still hesitate to slash this...unperson.

Morpho paid no heed, minding the spritz, which had now gathered in a twist of plastered waters. The black immersion below pooled under the spate, pushing the crystal foam to the top of a plateau formed completely out of the azure liquid. He controlled the overflowing pillar as he fed on his Master's power, Lord of the Dark Water, The Dark Dweller. "The Son of Primus needs to be destroyed." Morpho's slithering wheeze scuffed, he did not ignite one glimpse away from the source.

"If you don't cease, you'll destroy us with him!" Mantus shouted drastically, terror and acrimony rising in volume. His drawn sword became awkward for him to cling on to, he almost botched it with the ever-shifting of the ship. In his gait he stood like a waddling duck, a pithy attempt to keep himself upright. He fell over once and enabled to thrust his sharp metal into a protruding bastion of tough wood on the pier, using it to pull himself up to his knees.

Just as Mantus saved himself from sliding, a very stubby one-legged pirate skidded across the ship. "What Bloth doing that make Maelstrom sway like Janda-palm? Whoooaaa!" The panicked peg-legged Konk hectically fumbled in wonder as he coasted the deck on his stomach, aiming to catch nail of a floorboard.

"It's not Bloth, you idiot pig!" Mantus yelled in frustration at the chubby swab. "Noy jitat." His attention focused to the three forms emerging from the alternative exit out of the canals connecting to the Constrictus pit.

Ren and Ioz arose along with Tula from the underworld of the Maelstrom, seeking any sign of the Wraith. Ioz spotted it hanging off the port. "There!" He pointed out, tracing to the speedy craft.

"Son of Primus!" Morpho hissed. He swerved to eyeball the shape of Ren following Ioz, who had made way toward the captured clipper. The water flared up higher now, almost elevating the entire Maelstrom up about double its extent were it placed pointing downward to each end. When Ioz had nearly whisked Ren up to the banister of the Wraith, the youth hearkened Tula's call out to him.

"Ren!" Tula screamed after, as Bloth had surfaced not long succeeding the crew. The Pirate Lord retained the ecomancer's hand and would not let go, threatening to take her head off with a lone swipe of the powerful blade. Pummeling winds were sweeping around them. The ghastly ogre grinned tyrannically at Ren, focused on the Compass around the neck of the lad. The Captain's twin-beard was a matted mess from being down in the bilge waters, endowing him with an even more menacing appearance in his enraged state.

"Tula, hold on!" Ren cried out in a frantic gale. He raced to spring down from the schooner, but stopped as the freighter rendered one huge heave and Bloth had not only released Tula, but the leathal cutter as well. It skimmed down the measure of the deck, reaching it's destination against the bony-spiked railing of the Maelstrom and quivering as it rooted itself.

"No!" Bloth thundered a protest with thwarted wrath. His spry eye flared with gall. Tula skittered up immediately and then a flash of red feathers swooped down and picked her up, gliding to the Wraith.

Ioz browsed at the scene of Morpho and the spire playing out before his viewpoint, then his eyelids over the rings of mahogany amplified to about the proportion Mantus's had previously expanded to. "Scot pango! What on Merr...you'd better hurry up monkeybird! It looks like the jitatan fish-face is conjuring up a leviathan-sized seastorm and I don't wanna be around for it!" Ioz mortally extruded. He directed to will Niddler, who approached the vicinity.

"You're okay Tula! I was so worried!" Niddler gently dipped Tula to the platform of the captured ship, folding his wings at the sidelong as he let his feet touch down. This wasn't any time for a warm reunion. "Ioz! The ship is lopsided, it feels like we're going to fall off!" Niddler screeched with flustered chagrin. Tula scurried to prepare the sail of the Wraith for a grievous run.

"It's that kreld-eating sea-beast of the dark water's doing!" Ioz blared as he motioned to the crux of the trouble. He cleaved the rope that sealed the Wraith to the wafting fossil.

Ren endeavored to blitz his way back from the perimeter where he posed. "Ioz! Prepare to set sail!" The young leader screamed an urgent command as he planted across the tier with stability, plugging for the wheel of the vessel and clenching the surrounding barrier with all his might.

"It's going to be a long drop! Hold on!" Ioz split the rope as the voyagers locked on tightly to whatever strong fortitude they could find on their ship.

"Mantus! Go after them! Now! Don't let them escape! Get the boy and rip him apart!" Bloth boomed in a furious upset, throughly enraged. Madly, he thrashed his recovered saber against the bulwark of the mammoth war-craft.

"I can't do anything when we're this high up! It's the disciple's doing!" Mantus howled in return, just as disabled to do anything.

"What?!" With his singular gaze, the cruel Captain spied the Wraith falling an unfathomable descent below the impossible water plateau in the middle of the vast expanse. He burned in disbelief, and now horror.

"So it ends. Now." Morpho hissed broodingly, his final words before finished. The water flared up even more extravagantly, manifesting itself into a mold of giant sea-twister. The two crews faintly made out the silhouette of their enemies's ships through the crystalline water. Then the wave parted, prematurely scattering every object and particle entwined within a great distance.


	2. Revival

Chapter 1

REVIVAL

PART 1 - Wings of Cowardice

Thirteen Treasures of ancient time, Thirteen Lessons of Rule in rhyme. To find the jewels in secret places, Follow where the Compass faces. If returned from the shore beyond, A new day dawns for Octopon. But if they fall into evil hands, Darkness descends on all the lands. For these riches, Two shall vie. In the realm of Dark Water where the Treasures lie.

The beam of dawn peered through the portholes of the cabin on the Wraith, awaking a young man from his slumber. In his dreams he recited the ancient poem that Alomar taught to him from the Abbey of Galdebar. For what reason he could not explain, it stuck in his mind. He would always be able to remember it perfectly whether he wanted to, or not. His mind stirred with visions and images of the previous events within his repose. Ren reached for his father's heirloom sword and secured it in his hand as he strolled outside to check the ship.

The regal youth was greeted by the familiar scarlet-feathered companion. "You're awake Ren." Niddler indifferently mumbled, munching soundly on a half-cracked minga-melon.

"I see you are too, Niddler. How's the ship?" Ren diverged to mosey around at his surroundings. They were not docked very far from land. He could see the deep foliage of the rural border on the island of Kalinda. The morning light shone, calm and peaceful. It was almost mysterious, skipping through the forests. It was early, not yet sunup even, shades of blue still persisted in the canopy of the new sky. He could scout nothing of worry on the horizon. Niddler seemed preoccupied, Ren was not earning a response. "I see you're enjoying your breakfast, Niddler." He followed up his query.

"Oh! Uh, sorry, the Wraith has been fine, nothing has bothered the ship for as long as I've been out here." Niddler would be startled out of his own trancing tempo, he paused his chomping to grant Ren reply.

"Good. We need to head to town soon, we're running low on food and supplies." Ren stilled to embrace the Compass in his fist, gazing out to the location it endured to point in. "If we stay here much longer, I might need to get some form of live." The handsome captain mused languidly, a direful frequency for staying afloat percolating his leadership.

"I don't see why we just can't find the other Treasures and come back to this one. It's giving us so much trouble." Niddler persuasively reasoned. He nibbled what remained of the fruit off of a minga-melon seed, eying it with scrutiny and then strayed back up. "I mean, Bloth is still out there, right?" He finished up his criticism.

"I'm sure he is, but we can't leave, Niddler. I have a feeling this is the Treasure we need to find next, and the Compass wouldn't point that way if he found it. I just need to figure out what the Compass is trying to tell us. Besides, since the Wave, Ioz and Tula are still out there somewhere. We can't just give up on the idea of finding them again." Ren curtailed his formulation, leaning off the boundary of the ship. He stroked his coarse chin with his fingers, now feeling the developed rough. He had grown taller now, his hair was longer since the start of the Quest. He watched the wind flapping the Wrath's flag over his head. It was the same tapestry that he and the devoted crew had decorated with their hands connected, in the way they always cheered when readying for the next adventure the tide would bring. Though the awning had been torn, it survived remarkably well for all it had gone through. The circle was still visible and unbroken. It had almost been a year, and weeks after the Great Wave. He did not know what happened between the time when he, Ioz and Tula had escaped from Bloth and the Constrictus and the time when he and Niddler came to, shipwrecked just off the isle of Kalinda. In retrospective, it seemed his journey led to Kalinda after all. The Wraith still was intact but it had needed much repair, which vitiated a few weeks. The Treasures were becoming more difficult to find. Only recently did he resume pursuing the 9th Treasure and he could not find out why the Compass beam stopped when he drifted too far out to sea.

"The Eyes of the Fallen Captain! If we go that way, our ship is sunk!" Niddler would be alarmed to a spooked garble at a flare up of two burning eyes in the clouds over the waterline. He gorged a Bentaar-pear inside his cheeks.

"That is just a legend, Niddler. Anyway, we won't be setting out until we restock. Considering we just bought full provisions of fruit yesterday, I'd say there isn't going to be much gold left on this Quest without Ioz around to keep us on our toes." Ren visibly lamented, he kept heart though his soul was weary.

"I suppose that makes sense." Niddler knew Ren was right, and though he was not sure about Ioz, he missed Tula. He liked having her around, she was always warm and gentle to him. Unlike Ioz, who always became irate with him for one reason or another. Despite this fact, he too wanted to see both of them again.

"Right. So we need to head to town." Ren stolidly stated, swaying from his on-looking perspective and moving to steer the cutwater closer to land.

The streets of Kalinda were flooded with people buying and selling...sometimes stealing. It's taverns grew full and bustling at all junctures. Onlookers communed and chatted amongst themselves as Ren and Niddler roamed through the marketplace. The two did not carry vast gold on them, so they wouldn't likely be a target for thievery, not that many people did try to steal from them in the following weeks.

"Hey, is that the guy who survived the Great Wave?" The chap in front of a shop gossiped.

"Huh? Yeah, that's him alright, I hear he's the Son of King Primus too. Really amazing." The owner debunked with a boisterous whisper, too loud to ignore.

"Really..." The customer dazed. He was eying the passing prince and making sure to get a good look at Ren's ensemble.

"You're quite popular, Ren." Niddler meekly hummed, staying close to his leader.

"It's a good thing that I am, otherwise I doubt these merchants would be so generous." Ren beamed with a grin of satisfaction, dangling a bag stuffed with goodies and supplies. Some of the items were even gifts from strangers, all kinds of odds and ends the two did not know what to do with, and probably would not even need. It wasn't any surprise that Ren had been the talk of the town in recent time, being not only the Son of the great King Primus, but also having survived the Great Wave that was visible from the measly seaside-town, most of the other surrounding towns as well. Indeed, the heir was procuring quite a reputation. "Anyway, Niddler, I think we have enough for the moment. We should head back soon." Ren motioned to Niddler trotting at his side. On the road back to the Wraith, they passed the tavern that Niddler could not enter and it did not matter much, because Ren settled no business there anyway.

"Wait! Son of Primus!" Shouted a man calling after Ren. He looked young in appearance.

"Yes? I am Prince Ren, Son of King Primus." Ren answered back, wavering toward and boggling at the stranger with curiosity.

"You seek the Treasures of Rule, correct?" The snoop inquired.

"I do. What do you mean to ask me?" Ren quizzically asked the confronting person, confounded by the sudden interruption.

"The next Treasure that you seek...it's someplace you wouldn't expect. It's hidden...concealed! By danger...danger!" The strange, and now hysterical guest warned. His expression of frenzy made him come off to be slightly crazy.

"What do you mean, Danger, and how do you know of this?" Ren pried of this harbinger, now seeming to be more puzzled and suspicious by the brash encounter.

"I can see many things, believe me! You won't find it on any map!" The odd and unbalanced visitor told.

Niddler did not like where this conversation veered to, not trusting the man. "Hey! I'll have you know, the Prince of Octopon happens to be very busy! Take your inane ramblings to someone who cares to listen!" Niddler swiveled to him in a dignified and bossy air. He pushed and pulled at Ren, wanting to go. "Come on Ren! I don't trust him!" He hauled on the prince's arm, giving a chatter and a nudge.

"Niddler, stop it!" Ren aggravatingly freed himself from the monkeybird, who squawked in response. He deliberated for an instant, wondering who this person may be and where he might be getting his facts. "Did you know my father? How do you know about the Thirteen Treasures of Rule?" Ren eyed the individual closely, lucid blues showing a combination of interest and perplexity.

"I can't say...but please trust-here, take this!" The stranger hurried out as if he could sparsely talk. He handed Ren an old and tattered scroll, which the boy cautiously accepted. The man ran off as quickly as he had engaged.

"Hey, wait!" Ren called back, he prepared to run after but the oddball sprang so apace that any shadow had already vanished.

Niddler squawked in a frenzy, pursing his feathers. "What a load of borca-paste." Niddler switched to Ren, inspecting the parchment his comrade had just received. "What is it, anyway?" He challenged with remote eagerness.

Ren opened the scroll. "It appears to be a map of this area. The location where the Compass indicated is marked on it, and there's something else...but it seems to be in some, unusual writing." Ren squinted as he picked apart the map with his resolve. "That's it, that's it, Niddler! I've got it!" The exuberant regal announced, his bright gaze dazzled with revelation.

"Got it? Got what, Ren?" Niddler cawed with interest, rubbernecking up at Ren.

"No time to waste, Niddler! Fly me back to the Wraith!" Ren delighted with anticipation, his face shone with the zeal for the Quest.

"Can't we walk back, we're carrying so much." Niddler complained, being opposed to physical exercise. He realized however, that when Ren discovered or figured something out, he was unshakable and required to act on it right then and there. "Fine, but you better let me in on this, and I want some extra minga-melons when we get back." The monkeybird reluctantly hovered up to position himself on the aristocrat's shoulders.

"I promise I'll tell you as soon as we get to the Wraith." Ren positively assured the monkeybird and retained the document under one arm, carrying the essential loot with the other. He smirked as he visualized schemes inside his head. The wind extended no resistance as they took off under the hot midday-sun.

Ren's feet touched down on the speedy vessel as Niddler flapped to the jetty of the ship for a respite. Ren expeditiously commenced the packing away of the items, barely glancing at the stock to make sure it all was there. He then filed up to the stout flight of steps that curved to the chief level of the Wraith and sat down, drawing out the map. The sanguine-feathered monkeybird already shuffled with no delay to the food section of the hold to claim a juicy minga-melon. They had not yet cast off.

Niddler began feasting as he patted over to Ren, his monkeybird feet tapping all the way. "So tell me Ren, what does it say?" With a stuffed beak the brightly colored hybrid probed to leisure.

"It means, even though we need to go back, we'll need to take a detour from a different direction. So that's why we couldn't find it before." Ren pensively garbled, fixated on the map and the ancient jargon as if coming upon an understanding. He was vague however, so it sounded more like he was thinking aloud.

"What does that mean? Go back where, Ren?" Niddler ceased his chomping to peek up at the youthful captain, demanding a response.

Ren instead bolted upward from where he was seated and sped to cut the line to shore. "We need to go to Arakna island." Ren stood and focused right on Niddler as he said those words, which would carry his dictate with surety. He held his sword at his periphery and then slipped it into his waist strap, he grasped a ditty with the other hand and scorched up the stairs to the wheel. He began steering off.

For a moment, what Ren expounded hadn't fully set-in with Niddler. "Arakna...what?" With puzzlement the monkeybird questioned. Then, it all came rushing back. "Arakna island?!" He coughed up a nibble of ripened melon-flesh. He flew over, screeching out a doubletake as he gripped his partially devoured meal and fluttered in front of Ren's face so he could be seen. "Ren, tell me you didn't just say we're going to the island of the caves of giant spiders that almost killed and ate us alive last time! No-no-no-no-no-no-no!" Niddler squawked and chattered in panic, wings beating mile-an-instant.

"We have to Niddler. The Compass points there." Ren stated purposefully, palming the Compass and shifting into the frequency the glittering ray shot out to. "It's the only location that makes any sense on this map." He judged as he unrolled the charting once more, guiding through the sea with one hand.

"It didn't point there before!" Niddler argued to unflappable wits. "Let me check this map again, I think you're reading it wrong." Niddler forcefully snatched the map from Ren, toting his melon under the other arm.

"Niddler, stop it!" Ren furrowed, grabbing the map back from his monkeybird protester. "The reason I think it didn't point there before is because it Is normal to arrive from the opposite direction of the island. For some reason, the Compass is only responding if we go to the berm of the island, which means there must be something else within our reach. Perhaps even at the center or underneath. The words on the map are written in the area just South." Ren carefully examined the article with a scrunched leer.

"Ren I think we need to go back to shore...we don't have enough supplies. Besides, we need fire and we don't have anything to light our torches with." Niddler confidently puffed, thinking this notion would change the determined prince's mind but then found it was soon shot down.

"Yes we do." Ren returned by upholding a satchel of cindersand given to him as a present from one of the townspeople. "This should be plenty enough to make our way through the caves." He smiled with pride.

Niddler whooshed in closer, trying to think of a viable retort. "Well..." Niddler briefly paused as he could not ponder and then he flew shortly to snap the portable map away again in frustration, being a sore loser. In an instant, a blade speared his half-eaten fruit, prying it out of his paws. "Hey! That's my minga-melon!" He squawked and chattered with rebellion, the blond teenager maintained it out of his reach.

"Niddler stop being so afraid or we won't be able to claim the Treasure, neither will we be able to find Ioz and Tula. We can't let Bloth get to the Treasure before us. If the dark water swallows everything, there won't be anything left. How long do you think you'll be able to eat minga-melons without minga-trees? You can carry the torch or you can stay on the ship." Ren sighed, frustrated about having to argue but felt as if he at last won the monkeybird over. He forked over the melon, which his friend salvaged. He took back his map.

Niddler pouted, he did not want to do either. "I don't want to be on the ship, what if Bloth finds us?" The avian whined. He was afraid he might drop the torch if he needed to take charge of it. "And fire and monkeybirds...don't get along." The fluff of his wings drooped when he finished complaining.

"Then you can stay close or on my back when we get there, but make sure you're quiet." Ren offered to end the disagreement. He lobbed a stare at the unwilling mess of feathers who perched on the rail nearby, comforting in a rind with both anxiety and anticipation. He roved onward, occasionally breaking to consult the map as he prevailed.

"Why can't anything ever be simple?" Niddler bellyached. He bore up from his melon and then succumbed, finishing it and making sure to consume all of it.

PART 2 - The Downfall of Trade

The sun drew high in the sky as an imposing ship made route across a vast stretch of sea. On its deck, an exchange of words and events was taking place.

"Twist my soul! That boy and his blasted ship of fools can't elude me forever! Mantus!" Bloth's growling voice boomed over the bridge of the Maelstrom as he addressed his commanding officer, peering through a looking-glass at the nearing port-city. He beat his enormous fist against the rock-solid edge of the huge platform.

"We'll be in Kalinda by high-sun, Milord." Mantus collectedly provided, prolonging to navigate the huge vessel that was the Maelstrom. With a tilt he was approaching the zone of the defenseless district. His boss became ever more hostile in his blood-lust for Ren, ever since the incident of The Great Wave. By fortune they had weathered, mostly intact with few of Bloth's crew lost in the waves. The Maelstrom received the least of the damage in the aftermath, being virtually impenetrable to almost everything. The current seemed to have fallen out from underneath the ship, letting it down easy. Whether this had been Morpho's doing or some coincidence was not known. Despite this fact, the immense cruiser would be knocked greatly off-course in the opposite aim intended, almost to the shores of Janda. The Maelstrom required only a few repairs, but repairs still. This only served to further fuel the gargantuan Captain's rage, from the soles on his clobbering feet and to the shoulders spikes of his green cape.

"Good. I want you to prepare me several squadrons of our elite men to accompany me. If I can't find the Wraith's wreckage, then I'm going to find the boy's whereabouts...personally." Bloth barked the order to his second-in-command, laying emphasis on the last word uttered from his abhorrent mouth. His goldenrod eye distended with sinister intentions on the town quite-pure in comparison.

"Yes, Lord Bloth." Mantus obliged obediently and adjusted sight at the evil lord in surprise, cocking an eyebrow. This was a command he rarely heard torpedoed from his captain's arsenal. He diverged back to steering, it would merely be a little longer before they would disembark.

In the town of Kalinda many onlookers watched an object in the distance, at first echoing of a wayward cloud. It then began to take its shape. Bones protruding from a taut face that melded the front of the vessel, growing out of the mist. "It's the Maelstrom!" Only one phrase from a spectator sent the entire town into dismay, the streets filled with people screaming and running for refuge. The heralding crusher advanced at an extraordinary speed, bearing down upon its target only in the few moments after it had been spotted on the horizon.

Bloth paced back and forth along the planking, waiting to arrive. His crew dared not come disturb him with the exception of a half-braindead Konk, who learned his lesson swiftly after being kicked several lengths from where he stood. Mantus held the controls, about to give the men the order to dock. Bloth vised his sword at guard, preparing with the multifold ruffians from his surrounding assembly. "We're in port, Bloth!" Mantus finally announced. The anticipation had decidedly been too much.

"Excellent." No sooner did the commander issue the word to drop anchor and pull out the board than did the leviathan-sized Captain march enraged down the ramp of the warship and into the affright port with his vicious minions in tow. There were a small number of the men leading dagrons behind. He and his looters tore through the market, destroying anything in the path. Slashing through stands and pavilions with no regard for the poor or innocent. Many cries were heard from those unlucky enough to cross blades with the pillaging brigade. Others, trying hard to duck out-of-the-way, were silent. He entered one of the taverns, busting the door open from the hinge. "Where is the Son of Primus?" Bloth's roar was of bloodcurdling hostility as the frightened goers sunk behind tables and chairs. He scanned around the place with his probing eye, grunting bitterly under lurid breath. He set his sights on a bystander whom he hooked up by the shoulder, lifting up and off the ground. "Where is he?!" Bloth crashed at the innocent and daunted man.

The man chosen as Bloth's victim had indeed encountered Ren in town as everyone had and like many he favored the young prince, even close to considering him an honorable acquaintance, if not a friend. "I-I don't know, Bloth!" The patron choked out, violently afraid.

"You lie. You'll tell me now!" Bloth's alert words were ominous as he eyed the petrified groveler. Mentally, he tore down defenses.

"But...the Son of Primus is good! He's a friend!" The good fool spoke bravely, a little too bravely.

Bloth appeared wrathful but he bellowed a laugh, feeling amused at the denizen's boldness. "Now, now, dear man. What matters more, the goodness of a boy who is not here or the goodness of the man who holds your life in his hand, decent old-fellow?" He poised to survey his company of termagant raiders, who snorted and jeered in reaction. He cleaved his severing blade over the man's head, stilly biding to bring it down. "Or would you like me to take you back to my ship and feed you to my Constrictus?" The cacophonous blackguard intimidated, internally spiking his prey straight in the eye. Several of the innfolk were doing their best to stay covered, not a single one of them wanting to be Pirate Lord's next quarry.

"No! I wouldn't like that Bloth!" The tramp gathered a cough, pulling himself together. "I don't know where the boy is. I know he sometimes comes to the market and he survived the Great Wave." He paused to breathe and continued. "He seems to be flying solo with only a monkeybird of red with him." The hapless man exhaled. "That's all I know!" The informant obeyed the indomitable cutthroat, his squeal treble and pleading. He shook in his upset and tried to catch a breeze, not wishing to know what would become of him next.

"Ah." Bloth raised a finger to ponder this new information for a fraction.

The man grew too terrified and awestruck to speak, then he loosened his tongue and began to beg. "Can you please...let me-" The coward started to finish but was crumbled.

Bloth glared at him with repugnancy, knowing the succedent thing about to be asked, one eye collecting. "Bah! Worthless!" He growled, launching the man a substantial length of at least three tables into the wall of the saloon. The paltry victim wailed, experiencing the sensation that he would meet his end after the scuff, but he survived the impact. Bloth and his crew packed toward the door to leave, the frequenters of the tavern waited needlessly long to stir.

Behind a table in the inn hid another patron who had given Ren the map. "This is not good." The soul of imminence mumbled under a silent respire. "Must find the meaning of The Surge from Northern Skies..." He revivified his promise.

Bloth left the pub and headed back for the Maelstrom. "Bloth, I know another method of finding the Son of Primus." Before a halfway point to his destination, the slither of a corruption summoned him. Morpho had evidently followed him into town, concealed and robed.

Bloth's amber glim widened. "What business brings you here, Morpho?" The Captain quelled his ire and directed attention upon his insidious ally. That phrase made him skeptical.

"I can locate where the boy may be headed, through my Master of The Dark Water, The Dark Dweller." Morpho whispered from underneath an opaque cloak, shadows disappeared from his obscure form as he slipped forward. Bloth ordered his company back.

"Why did you not mention this to me before, Morpho?" Bloth inquired with discretion, browsing his subject intently. He kept his temper in check.

"My Master knows where his powers can't reach, those places are being blocked by the Treasures of Rule. With the eight of them found and pooling in Octopon, we have a sense where the other five may be, and the Son of Primus will transit those areas." Morpho explained with a peculiar sound, hiding the deformed portion of his facade under the dark shroud.

Bloth detracted to contemplate, plying a finger to his chin in consideration. "Very well Morpho. Come, join me." The wicked Captain trawled his way to the dagrons, mounting one and ushering for the slime-bodied abnormality to take the other. They talked grotesque deals in private as they returned to the freighter.

"Mantus! Set course for Arakna island!" Bloth's pursuit boomed through the sky above as he flew in on a bulky dagron near to the plateau of the deck, the veiled disciple piloted one at his side.

"For where, Milord?!" Mantus, who kept watch on deck, stared with inflated eyes and trembled out at his employer, who just issued him the second unusual directive of the day.

"Did I not make myself clear, Mantus?" The contemptuous pirate resounded back to the cohort.

"You heard him! Anchor up!" The commander snapped the order at several of the subordinates.

The Pirate Lord's flying beast drove up and out of range of the cronies on the Maelstrom below. "Morpho, this plan had better work. That wretched boy and his abominable crew nearly had me ripped to shreds, even during the blasted seaquake!" Bloth's dagron virtually touched the clouds before circling and preparing to come in for a landing.

"If I hadn't interfered, you would have been, Bloth, but you need not worry, you are very important to the Dark Dweller. Together we will eliminate the Son of Primus!" The snakelike fanatic spewed, his despise shone in a burning scorn. Before the reptiles came at rest, the Captain eyed him with a gut unease.

Ren and Niddler sailed in the direction of the dangerous land for a distant time, the sun had started to go down and twilight spilled over the shoreline.

"Ren, are we there yet? Ohhh...my stomach hurts, I shouldn't have eaten so many melons..." The monkeybird all but doubled-over in pain. Though he was aware he often overate when he worried, he had really overdone it this time. He flopped on down across the board with a thud, curling into a fetal position like a monkeybird Biperian-egg.

"We should be there soon. Look!" Ren signaled on his enthralled guidance as he pendulated his Compass, it was shining toward the direction they were headed but just a bit short of its mission. "This must be it, it has to be pointing to some part of the island we can't see. According to this map, we should continue going forward. Past the Compass beam." Ren instructed as the schooner shuttled farther into the darkening sky.

"Does it point to anything that can stop a stomach-ache?" Niddler groaned as he was carelessly overstuffed and regrettable on the floor.

Ren glanced at Niddler, lowering his eyebrows in concern and resumed steering. "Courage, Niddler, we're going to need to start searching as soon as we touch ground." The Wraith pulled farther inward of the atoll, but the glow of the Compass had disappeared as if they were on top of it. "It can't be far." He ascertained his premonition.

"Ohhh..." Niddler ached but managed to pick himself up. Suddenly, the bow heaved and he was pommeled to his back. He squawked. "That was uncalled for!" He lifted up his head in travail.

"Noy jitat! I think we hit something, Niddler!" Ren clattered to the edge of the seacraft. They had indeed hit something, though he could not tell what it was. He now saw the rim of the island on the verging distance. The keel was parked on a narrow strip of sand. "This must be what the Compass is pointing to." He jumped down from the railing, being sure the surface was flat. He kicked it with his boots, but all he felt was some impenetrable mass. "We need to dock here." He affirmed with temerity, pacing through the twilight dust to the landmass that was under his feet.

The monkeybird, who was only partially listening to the boy through his pains, didn't volunteer. "Ok Ren, let me know when we're ready to leave." Niddler unwittingly griped. Not wanting to move, he stayed continuously sprawled-out and incapacitated on the deck.

"Come here, Niddler!" The regent ordered in reply as he worked the sail to subside. He was fooling with the rope and perusing for something to secure the ship to.

"Coming Ren!" The monkeybird pulled himself together, whining as he paddled in the direction of the young man's call. "I think I'm gonna be sick." He impolitely fussed, being ever over-dramatic as he rested next to his adventurous friend.

Ren had tried stabbing the hard terrace with his blade but to no avail, it would not budge. "There's something under here but it looks like we'll need to find another way in." Ren pensively murmured, gathering his equipment from the small pack he had brought off the vessel. He pulled out a torch for lighting and some cindersand. He lit the torch with the intent on walking to the rocky brink of the island, which focused into view in the area beyond. "We may have to go through the entrance we did before." He intelligently deduced the dilemma. The sun continued to set quickly, only a thin line of red light remained on the horizon.

"Awk!" Niddler squawked. Pouncing up on the prince's back, he stalled to remain close to the torch. "Please be careful..." The cowardly avian transmit in a worried tone as Ren hiked toward the corridor of the cave on the otherside of the terrain.

Niddler adhered to Ren like the last shelf of overhang that would prevent his tumble into an ocean of darkwater-swallowing sea-monsters, and on a stomach full of Draja-fruit. It did not seem to bother Ren. Niddler was a bit heavy and it slowed him down marginally, but the avian was not too much of an ordeal for him to carry. Ren plowed on, almost entering the cave as he noticed something looming on the vista. Something was expanding. At first it was vague, but he instantly recognized the features a few moments after it emerged. Ren uttered the first instance of the nearly forgotten words he had not mentioned in weeks. "The Maelstrom!" The adolescent hero's eyes showed an awed determination. He ducked behind a rock near the inlet of the cave.

Niddler chattered. "Like this couldn't get any worse...what do we do now, Ren? He's going to find us here...and ohhh my aching stomach!" Niddler reeled in discomfort and stress, anxiety overtaking him.

"We get a jump on him and hope he doesn't see us! Be quiet!" Ren clamped his hand over the mouth of the noisy monkeybird, shushing him. He then scampered for the cave entryway, entering the murky and grody tunnel. He glimpsed back for a mere crinkle of a brow to see the Maelstrom only just elapsing to the seaboard. The lit flame was the only thing that showed through the impeccable blackness.

Niddler shied his head under his master's long ponytail, providing a safe haven for the frightened monkeybird's spirit. He tried to fade as much as possible, clinging close to the light but holding just far enough away from it so that it wouldn't singe his feathers. He understood that fire meant safety in this dangerous destination. He sensed it started to peeve Ren, but the boy did not say anything. "This place is even creepier when it's dark out. I wish I was back home..." Niddler pitifully trembled out, hanging on his bronzed companion as if for dear life.

Ren explored the gloomy chamber with shifting eyes. "We'll be fine as long as we keep the torch lit, we've been lucky so fa-" The prince was cut off by an eight-legged beast coming down on them from an adhesive line, dripping thick and acidic goo from the pincers that formed its mouth. It let out a high-pitched scream as it attempted to wrap its spiny legs around the startled youth, and it would have, had he not swiped the blazing heat at the threatening webspinner.

"Ren look out!" The monkeybird shrilled, evading behind the regality's head as the lad swung the flare in a full spin at the droves of web-creatures that leapt at them from all directions. The piercing squeals may have frightened him even more than the spiders themselves.

"So maybe I underestimated how many of them were here." The spry prince gulped as his daunt skylights watched up in horror at the neverending stream of huge arachnids flowing down from the ceiling of the grotto.

"Mantus! Prepare to dock!" The nefarious Captain gave his orders as he paced across the floorboards. He scoured at his surroundings. The seaside was dark, so was the cave. Everything was dark. Only the sliver of luminosity from what lingered of the dual crescent-moons of Merr shone through obscurity. Several of his marauders who gathered in preparation to leave the destroyer carted flares lapped high, giving the already ominous warship a perilous, red-orange glow in the night. He delighted toward his objective. "By the two moons, I'll make that boy suffer if I have to ravage every island on Merr!" The infamous lord gnarled as he starred into the everpresent isolation, his own lit flicker held at the ready.

"We'll be ready as soon as Strand finishes fumbling with the anchor." Mantus directed his attention to the four-armed humanoid pushing the voluminous anchor over the hull of the relic. "Drop it already, you brainless-filth!" The commander rapt with annoyance at the subordinate.

"I've got it! I've got it!" The quadrate thug struggled with a rat's squeal to lift the anchor with a few other pirates, carrying it in arms. He at last chucked it over the fringe, alleviating his rodent face. It hit the deep as a league of the men at Bloth's disposal pulled out the board.

"Onward! To the blood of the Prince!" Bloth thundered at his troops, who were slamming way down the ramp. Burning torches poured into the mouth of the hollow.

The immense swarm of oversized spiders pursued a terrified prince and his monkeybird through the buried tunnels of the cave. They flew past several dryrotted skeletons, partially or completely consumed by the treacherous webbing.

"Awk! Ren, help! I'm going to drop it!" Niddler desperately yawped, floundering with the torch that somehow ended up in his possession. No longer piggybacking, he swung the beacon around wildly at the spawning mob. He was bumbling and clumsy, almost flailing it. The lad then snatched it up and spun both the torch and his blade with dexterity, slashing back at the penetrating wall of sticky limbs.

Ren backed up farther into the recesses. He started to become overwhelmed as he chopped away. Niddler loitered close and now embraced his leg. "We just have to hold them back, there has to be a clearing soon." The blond-haired pioneer strained to catch his breath through choked exhales. From running and fighting, even he began to feel himself loosing stamina.

"We should have gone back and tried to find another way in." Niddler gushed the noise of a distressed squawk. "Do we even know where the Compass is pointing?" He cowered and shook, clutching his friend's leg. They were slowly being moved backward, they would be forced endlessly into the dreary caverns.

Ren impaled another spider, which shrieked and retreated. He veered a glance apropos of the way they came in, seeing a copper luster splintering around the bend. His eyes jolted in reaction. Voices came and though he could not make them out, deep sounding grunts and growls echoed through the contour along with the jeers and occasional frightened screams. "Chungo lungo! We can't, Niddler! Bloth's got us cornered! Ay jitata!" Angstful, Ren swore outloud but quiet enough. He tried to catch his air. He stabbed at another advancing screamer and ran boundlessly into the grim dwelling, grasping the monkeybird's primate-hand after he had bounced back up on Ren's shoulders.

"This is going to end well." Niddler whined terrifically, emitting a last mimic of sarcasm before they made for the void like the winds of the sea.

Bloth and his troublemakers marched through the cave and met the same number of spiders, only with far less trouble due to profuse lamps and numbers. Only the hooligans forming the outskirts of the group would need to worry about the evil spinners. The surplus of injured spiders lay on sides of the cavern, some only lost legs and were advancing on the cutthroat masse. "Torment my eyes!" The Pirate Lord avouched. He raised his lethal blade over an approaching vermin which possessed only five legs, and dealt it a fatal blow. He boosted up the beast by one of its remaining feelers, examining it. "Our prince has been here, Konk." He smiled cleverly, curdling a promise of sorrow. Gawking ahead, he saw more picked-off spiders in his path. "And he's going to lead us right to him!" He grunted as he wrought the handle of his pyre, lurching it at more of the approaching bane.

"Konk hope we find Ren soon, Bloth. Konk don't like giant spiders!" The fat pig-of-a-pirate sliced at an eightleg coming close to him and cowered, hiding behind his boss. "Ow!" He hollered out with a yelp. The irritated captain growled as he kicked the short man off his pegleg.

"That's right, just to the end of this tunnel!" Ren and Niddler ran with the sustaining energy that was left in them. "Niddler, I might need you to fly us out of here." He weakly asserted to the monkeybird, who was now unaided in escape but still ambulatory. The two surmounted to a temporal break in activity. Ren stopped to regulate his toiling lungs.

"I don't think I can, Ren, the ceiling is too low, and those things are still after us." Niddler mournfully refuted and quit, mooring to Ren's leg as an azure stone gleamed in the epitome.

"The Compass!" Ren attended to the revival of the prismatic gem around his neck, looping it in hand. It motioned to the very end of the way, almost reached. The spiders appeared either to have all crawled out of their holes, or stopped hunting them. "Now let's just hope the Treasure is nearby and there's another way out of here." Ren gave into a pant and picked up his feet, trudging onward to follow the beam. Niddler kept proximately behind.

The mates breached upon a chamber at the end of the tunnelway, from it emanated a green brightness out of a hole in the floor of the crag. "There's something glowing!" The monkeybird squealed ecstatically, fluttering to the fountain of the prominence. Ren ascended after.

"You're right Niddler! This must be it! Now we can-" The teen of flaxen locks was cut off by a dangling spider aiming to attack, which he achieved a whisk of his blade at but before he could, the grandeur eightleg fell limp. He could detect the sound of a razor scoring into it.

"You mean this is it for you!" The chilling invoke filled the air. Ren cut to its source, flashing his metal, which met with one much larger than his own. One impact and the blade was torn out of all sweep as a foot stepped on it. Then the bundle of crimson wings charged into flight, an angry primate-bird incised at the offender's face with scrappy claws until several arrows rolled out of the same direction. Feathers stuck to the wall. The net lobbed down and from the vibrant ball-of-fluff ensued dramatic screeches. Ren somersaulted in an attempted dodge but was surrounded by ripping weapons barbed at his throat. "Tie them, and make sure they can't escape." The zooming sword pointed toward both, the indomitable brute's frown contorted into a smile.

The rope bound the two heroes tightly against each other. "I knew something like this was going to happen." The unavailingly-plumed avian differed in opinion as he glanced tenderly at his friend stuck in the same mire as he was, but then quieted at the overshadowing hostility of their captor.

"I have you now, my foolhardy Prince! Thanks to you, the Compass is mine at last, and the 9th Treasure of Rule is too." The lordly and remorseless Bloth gloated as he polished Ren's keen crystal. He unclenched a fist and let a mangled spiderleg drop to the ground.

"Nice to see you again too, Bloth." The wearied boy's words were dripping in disgusted mordacity.

"I told you we should have given those spiders a proper send-off." Niddler craned his neck opposite to appropriately wisecrack, whispering his point to the conjoined Ren.

"Retrieve the Treasure!" The vile Captain instructed, pointing to the chosen units of his crew and giving Ren a sneer.

Several men scattered to bung to the direction of the glow. "Bloth! The hole is too small for us to go through, it's being blocked by something!" The lead surveyor informed, gyring toward his boss.

"What?!" Bloth yelled, taken aback and infuriated. Ren mustered a smirk and a restrained snicker, which caught the attention of the evil one but he only glanced and cycled back to his legion. "Bah! Then we'll have to make room." He turned from the lackey, glaring wickedly at his prisoners. "As for you..." Before he could finish, he stunted at the phenomenon of ruination upon him, a flood of spiders were pouring down from the high crest of the catacomb and attacking all of Bloth's minions. The raider troop swung their torches, and to no avail. The creatures agilely dodged the fire and climbed up their victims, attempting to encase them in deadly spidersilk. Astoundingly, it had only taken a few moments before they were consumed. Some scoundrels dropped their blaze, unable to hold on. The horde was on them, bombarding as if enamored with their new quarry. Three of them were on Bloth and attempting to wrap him up as he panicked, slicing with his sword and the light. The Compass jilted to the ground from off of his neck.

"Noy jitat! Retreat!" Bloth called for his bandits, some of which were already making for the exit and others were being tread on. He bounded toward the opening of the cavern where he imprisoned his captives and with one final act of vengeance then a nasty gnarl, torched one of the bleached skeletons wrapped in silk, throwing it in front of where Ren and Niddler were tied. Despise consummated in his pitilessly staring eye before he escalated completely out of the cavern. Through the flames Ren and the monkeybird saw two forms, one of which pitched to the ground. Then a hand reached out to retrieve the Compass, only visible as it would be hued with a brilliant-blue glisten through the fire.

Some time following, a heralding freighter carried way into a conventional marina.

"Leave! Yo ho! To Janda-town we go!" The ecstatic crew from Bloth's warship cheered, at last docking at the port city of cheater's riches.

"'Ey, wait for me!" Another straggler joined the cluster, chunking skinless potatoes.

"Only real Maelstrom men go to Drakkle's." The scratchy blademaster insisted with the point of a rangy finger. He fetched a hefty bag of plenteous wealth under arm.

"You and Strand are the only mateys who say that, Mantus. Drakkle's ale taste like sea-water, and you know it." His helm of horns facing Mantus, an ox of a marauder sonorously disagreed.

"Then go to Zoolie's with Konk, wench-tongued larva." The swordsman scoffed with a turn of a hand. "Come, Vlor. At Drakkle's waits our fortune." With the cast of a sable mane and a lip of misconduct, the tradesman greedily caromed ahead.

"Ay', Mant' it c'n't wait, ya dirty-ol'd seadog! Th's time I'm o't fer 'yer lifesavins'. Aarrgh!" Vlor gnarled before signaling with a jubilant salute, and chased after Mantus down the gangplank. With hankering eyes of turquoise and a salivating avidity, the balding steel-wielder watched Mantus haul the spoils halfway until the periwinkle garb ceased to swoosh.

"Avast, Mantus! No Janda-town for you, we have to propose our next move, and you are not allowed leave until our inventory from Kalinda has been accounted for!" Bloth's grunting summon halted the commander, Mantus formed a scowl as he trudged back to the deck with crossed arms.

"Ahh'r shoot, what'm I go'na do wih this gold? N'yone wanna be t'mporary barman-friend-forever? I's bet wit' yerr!" The green-vested swordsman piddled around the board until he was joined by the previous bovine-brute. Vlor promenade away with his new buddy.

"I be, Vlor! We go to Zoolie's! Rotten luck Mant' got babooned, that stockpile of 'his could buy m'y way off this bucket." The oxen warrior expressed as he strolled off to town with the clean-topped raider.

"Inventory is Vlor's ward." Mantus humbly advised, he glowered with steel at the disappearing blade-rogue. "What plans are there to create now? The underworld of Arakna is enigmatic. To obtain the Treasure means to annex the entire interior, which is impossible." The strategist argued the idiocy of their plotting, swinging a palm.

"Of course, Mantus, and I know just how to do it. I've been waiting for this day." Bloth chuckled into the night. Mantus had strolled toward the inventory sector when his tracks halted. "Mantus, I have another mission for you when we port at Bentaar." The Captain's summon strayed.

"Someone in the Bentaar Quin-village is in need of a marooning. Who, Lord Bloth?" Mantus cut around as he answered the call, curiously loosening his sword from the clip.

"Who do you think? Find our Lady's daughter." The Pirate Lord enforced his impetuous plans. "By the way, Mantus, don't bring them back to the Maelstrom. I don't need any more of...those kind of bones, nor do I need skulls to tell their heads apart. For the evils of Avadasia's Abyss, have a drink and eat a good meal while you're there. Enjoy yourself. Get your vitamins, and take your sword with you. We'll arrive within the moons." He lumbered to his quarters but not before tossing his loyal commander a reduced sum of gold. "One more thing, Mantus. When we meet again, make sure you give Grimrot his equipment. By the Abyss, send Nimbo." He swallowed a drink before an afterthought at one bowing archer and a living skeleton behind his gangling taskmaster.

"Aye, Nimbo is recharged, Commander." Degea clad in violet-and-rose advanced while informing her master of the status on a new recruit.

"Yes, Lord Bloth." Mantus collected his pay and bounced slippery eyes to count, then an unpredicted smile covered his qualms of stingy coins.


	3. Reunion

Chapter 2

REUNION

PART 1 - Castaway from Betrayal

The cramped cavern rapidly heated to a perilous level as the remnants of the long-deceased lit ablaze with red flames. There was little room to move where it and a pair of thriving figures were trapped.

"We have to get out, Niddler, and quick! Where's the Compass?" Ren groaned, laboring against the bonds. He had been far too weak from his long journey into the gloomy caves. Sweat was pouring down his face, the heat in the chamber was too intense and he felt himself about to collapse from overexertion.

"I can't see where it is! It's getting really hot! And hard to breathe!" Niddler coughed, the room was filling with smoke and he was panting heavily from the smelting fumes.

"Ugh! I have to try to reach the sword! Help me! Try to push me forward!" Ren grunted of persistence, trying to maneuver his way to the broken blade on the ground about half a length away. Niddler pushed himself back with his hindfeet, like Ren had told him to.

"Hurry up Ren! I can't hold us back any longer!" Niddler cried out, jamming backward with all the might his monkeybird toes could handle. He put Ren a few more paces toward his target.

"Almost...got it!" Ren choked aloud. He strained with every grain of vigor, barring his teeth. His hand ceased only a minuscule distance to the hilt. Suddenly, a coolness bathed the caverns. The fire was extinguished and now warm water flowed toward his hand. He let out an onerous sigh in relief, almost flooring. He did not have enough energy to ask what on Merr just happened, but he thanked Kuunda for it. Something resembling a boot kicked his sword to his hand.

"Chungo lungo, Ren! You can't keep yourself out of trouble!" The familiar snap had been diminished, Ren acquired enough brunt to peek up.

"Ioz! You found us here!" The young prince called out, overjoyed at the sight of the lost shipmate. Although, his face showed nothing but stunned easement. The friendly pirate appeared to be worn out, wiping sweat from his forehead, but did not look nearly as bad as Ren felt.

"Ugh. The next time the two of you go wandering by yourselves into a cave of web-spinning monsters with Bloth at your tail, tell me so I can bring a healing-box along." Tula lethargically greeted through words dotted with witticism. She sauntered forward to the three, Compass in palm. "It was fortunate that leviathan wasn't good at holding on to his plunder." She carried a flimsy scold as she braced one arm over her head as if dizzy. She seemed to be exhausted and nearly about to pass to unconsciousness as well.

"Tula! Ioz! I'm so glad to see you!" Niddler enthusiastically chattered, verily solaced by the unexpected company. He tried to get up and release his wings but only managed to wiggle and clump back on Ren as the two were still conjoined by the back.

"We can't repay you enough, Ioz." Ren gratefully squeezed out as the monkeybird tumbled on him and made him grunt.

"Save it, if we had gotten here a moment short you would have been spider-repellent." The thrill-seeking buccaneer criticized the foolhardy teen. "If you want to be thanking someone it should be the woman-I mean Tula." Ioz wound a glance at his female crewmate, helping to keep her stable from the ecomantic whiplash that always hit her when she attempted to control nature too vivaciously. "She was the one that got the kreld-eater and his sea-thugs off your back." He shot concerned eyes at Tula, who was starting to earn some of her strength back. The Andorian beauty mustered a shaky smile.

"Thanks a lot Tula, I owe you. Where have you guys-" Ren began sheepishly, he smiled at his friends when his stamina revived enough to sit up. "Whoa!" Niddler decked over his wings, causing him to fall off-balance.

"Heh, I guess we should get you two out of those jitatan armstraps." Ioz mustered a weary laugh. He assisted the two up and off the ground, then cut them free. Ren stretched his arms, then fetched his antique weapon. The rope created markings on the adolescent's skin that stung, and Niddler spread his wings, feeling as if he were about to stumble from alleviation.

The four sat down on the floor to pause for an intermission. Ren and Niddler drank from canisters of water that Tula transported with her. Ioz was the first to summarize what happened. "Tula and I ended up blown nearly all the way to Janda-town after that seastorm. At first all we were able to hold was a board, a part of the Wraith that broke off. We were close in vicinity to that kreld-eater's nest and when we heard that Bloth was in a rage that he couldn't find you, we stow aboard. It was hard to keep ourselves concealed enough to keep the dartha-eel from noticing us on his ship for a good length of time and still manage to hang on for as long as we did. We guessed he was trying to find you, but I didn't expect he would raid Kalinda or go busting skulls like he did. We were appalled when we found out he was going to tear down the chunga-lungan town looking for you. When we found out you sailed all the way to this jitatan place, we planned to ambush the sea-scum." The dusky-haired sailor designed with a hint of altitude. He spoke of truth, but the prince harbored the impression he left out some of the more distressing details.

"What do you mean Ioz? He raided Kalinda? That can't be, we were there the whole time!" Ren's inflection ascended with disbelief, flabbergasted at what he was hearing.

"Maybe you thought you were there." Tula knowingly stated. "If you were in Kalinda at all, there was no way you could not have seen him!" Tula's manner suggested it was a shock to her to be learning of Ren's ignorance.

"Then by Kuunda, you must have just missed each other. The way that rudderless ox and his lunkheads tore through the town you'd think they'd sunk his jitatan ship." Ioz confirmed as he gaped at Tula, and then back at Ren. Both were grim and bewildered that their peers knew nothing of the episode.

Ren drew a sip of his water. "That wicked Bloth, I swear by my Father's Soul I'll make him pay for this. I don't understand though, how he knew where I was going. This is all my fault...maybe I shouldn't have even started this Quest." Ren soberly droned, lowering disheartened eyes. He begot a downcast disposition, feeling sorrow for the people his archnemesis had made to suffer only because of him. Though he would normally be energetic, this time he was discouraged.

"No. It's not." Tula debated such shortness of passion with a subdued smile to the regal. "You don't have anything to do with the evils Bloth does, you're on this Quest to save this planet from its destruction by people like him." Tula earnestly reassured, her sympathetic ways always seemed to have a beneficial effect on Ren. The brunet charmer slouched into the wall then reached into a bag of supplies she had packed with her and pulled out a sliver of melon. She gave it to Niddler, who replied with a chipper squawk. "Did you tell anyone where you were going, Ren? Anyone in Kalinda? Anyone at all?" She resourcefully quizzed, trying to piece facts together. Her and Ioz's story validated the Pirate Lord was on the opposite side of Kalinda, very quickly he would have to figure out where Ren's trail would lead.

"Tula! Thank-you-thank-you-thank-you!" Niddler squealed with delight. He munched on his gift of the melon and nuzzled the ecomancer, who patted his head with a merry. Despite having eaten so much previously, he now found himself famished and composing those noises of a smacking beak. "He didn't, but wait, what about the man who gave you that map?" He paused between eating with full face and pried Ren about the scroll the youngster had been given, suddenly remembering to ask about it.

"Oh! I can't believe I forgot, that's right, Niddler!" Ren jarred with a start as he put down his tankard on the floor. He reached into his boot, pulling out the article the fellow had entrusted to him. "It survived well enough." He trumpeted as he carried a relaxed smirk. He unrolled the parchment and laid it on the silt.

Ioz lifted it and peered at it, his eyes narrowed. "I see Arakna island on here. This place. By Kuunda, what is with this jitatan writing?" The pirate squinted at the foreign words, trying to make sense out of their meaning. He dallied in his thoughts. The map reminded him of his sister, Solia. The last and only other time he had come here was with her. He desisted to a spell, in wonder of that moonrise ago she had lent him this map.

"I don't know, Ioz. I couldn't understand it, but I was able to use it to come here." Ren unluckily answered, not having any more of an inkling than his favorable colleague.

"Is it possible the man worked for Bloth and could have misled us?" Niddler solely theorized, having no trust for the stranger from the beginning. Despite his monkeybird inclinations for food and comfort he was a logical thinker, liken of the bipedal trio.

"I don't think so. It's too unusual, it seemed like he needed me. I could tell by his voice. I didn't get the sense he wished me any harm. The Treasure is here anyway, and Bloth couldn't take it even if he had." Ren mused as he angled his eyes with speculation and bemusement.

"You don't know that for sure, Ren. Remember, a good pirate never trusts anyone. This map though, it's old. Very old. There's no way he could have created it for con, but that doesn't mean he wasn't a gantha-washing shardfish." Ioz apprehensively dissuaded the boy's naivety. He handed the map to Tula, who was now penetrating it with her lush revision.

"That's possible, but it doesn't feel like it is. I don't believe it. I have a hunch there's something else going on. Something doesn't feel right about this." The majestic lad cast his gaze downward, again lost in inner scrutiny.

"Ren, that's a fool's talk. A pirate can't survive on suspicions alone! That kind of thinking is exactly the kind that gets the Treasures stolen from us! If the Treasure here and reachable, we'll have to assume there's a trap...or lose our lives." Ioz practically conflicted, not buying into Ren's impulsive intuition this time.

"No, Ioz, I think Ren is right. I sense something troubling with this situation too." Tula rounded her head to the rough swashbuckler, adding her two drabuls to the conversation. The raven seafarer seemed as if he wished to say something, but relented. Tula rubbed Niddler's crest, who was now finishing up the slice of fruit. She settled close to Ren, leaning against his shoulder as he struggled with devises.

"Whatever the case, we need to be careful. More people know about Ren now and some might wish him harm." Niddler applied himself with a dignified presence to the conversation.

"That's right, Niddler. We'll need to stay close." Tula devotedly reinforced a reliance on unity, to which everyone agreed. They all witnessed how bad events had turned when they were forced apart.

"They won't be able to for long. I promise I'll return all Thirteen Treasures to the City of Octopon. Then Bloth's terror and those of the dark water will end for good." Ren terrifically professed to his friends as he steeled up from a shadowed poise. He declared his charge with courage and determination to the ragtag bunch, his face showing an intense inner-fortitude and motivation. Their loyalty would not be broken, and Ren was sure the time they were apart would only make the righteous Quest stronger, for each of their misfit purposes as One.

"That's right! We'll be an unstoppable force! Just you wait, Bloth, because of us you're going to overthrow your squid-market!" Niddler stood tall, pointing a monkeybird-hand forward with a ruffle of feathers in an expression of comical and exaggerated bravery that gave a grin to Ioz and Tula. He fell off his balance with a startled squawk, making the two laugh sprightly in result.

"Whatever the case of the Treasures, I think we've waited around long enough to get back to finding this next one." Ioz commenced resolve, standing up with sword in scabbard and ready to go. "If we hang around here too long those web-spitters may start to miss us." He brushed toward the pebbled opening in the floor, which contained the ever aglow, emerald light. He sat down and exert to cram his legs through the hole, but it was too taut. "Chungo lungo, looks like I'm not going to fit." He motioned of simplicity after trying to squeeze down the opening. He scrapped himself back up.

"Of course you don't, Ioz, it wouldn't let Bloth's crew down there either." Tula candidly curbed the humdrum with the obvious knowledge.

"I know that woman, I mean Tula." Ioz retorted as a glance shifted at the female shiphand, expressing his annoyed gesture. He plied on the thin rock-edge of the perforation, which did not budge. "Someone else is going to have to go through or we're going to need to find a way to bust this jitatan breach open." Ioz finished examining the entryway and plod back up.

"I don't think I can. Even if I could use my ecomancy, I'm not sure if I would be able to move it much." Tula tersely declined, her powers were spent and it would not be a good plan to attempt to shake the cave anyway.

"Niddler, do you think you can squeeze through that hole?" Ren petitioned the primate-bird, reclining to his pal's line of view.

"I can try." Niddler abode to offer, standing from his position. "What should I do if the Treasure isn't nearby?" The monkeybird pattered on opposable feet, astern the rippling entrance.

"Then come back and get us, we'll try to break our way in." Ren told his feathered-friend. He watched him slip passage into the crook with a succeeding squeeze of tight wings.

"I'm in!" Niddler cawed out as he hovered a scant length below the crack. The three human adventurers observed from above. Niddler flew around the wide-open outlet. It was twice, if not three times as capacious as the previous asylum. It was completely black and clammy, except for the mysterious fire of jade encompassing deep throughout. He chased the source of the enchantment, which seemed to be endless. Although, he noticed that it followed a curving serpentine, like the pattern of a river. He glided for an unobstructed time, trying to find the heart of the brilliance before he started to tire, at last giving up to make his way back to the access. Below the monkeybird's unescorted flight, a figure sat in seclusion...Completely unobserved.

"He's still down there, but I don't sense danger." Tula stated to inspire the pair beside her, who glued eyes in a lingering wait. She leaned over the aperture along with Ren and Ioz, gripping to its brim. Like she was able to feel everything within her immediate environment, Tula would know if Niddler needed help.

"The Compass points down the den but it stops right there and fades out!" Ren startled with discovery as he flicked the Treasure-finding rune over the polished fissure until at last his flying friend emerged from it, returning with the news.

"I didn't find the Treasure, the glow goes on for a great distance!" Niddler reported apropos to the gap. Out of breath and pulling himself up from the snugly wedged enclosure, he was straining to get his wings through. He fluttered himself up and over the rockface. Of all the tasks Niddler had been called on to perform for the crew, scouting was one of the most tiring. Second only to ferrying, of course.

"Then we'll have to smash our way in." Ren artfully conjured. He ducked down, probing at the edges of the solid cavity. "It doesn't feel like it's too strong." He assessed, getting up. "We can use that rock over there!" He beckoned toward a very broad stone near the wall of the chamber that appeared to be unfastened.

Ioz ambled toward the chunky sediment. He wrapped his arms around it, but it did not come loose at his urging. "A little help, Ren?" With a shaking voice, he signaled to the youthful regent to help him. The two men were then joined by the somber-haired ecomancer, who steadied the rock upright with her hands as they tugged it.

"Just bash it against the edges, I think they'll break." The blond royal called to his friends, groaning as he strove with a support of the weight to batter through the thin layer of quarry. They bashed the rock downward against the surface. Parts of it chipped off, but did not break.

"Noy jitat. I think you should have waited to save Ren after that leviathan had broken through, Tula. It would have been easier!" Ioz impolitely remarked as he strained to boost the rubble up a second time, his miffed babble toiled with tired grunts. He couldn't help but feel there may have been a faster way to do this.

"Ioz, keep your comments to yourself!" Tula breathed out, expending and clenching on to the slab as the three attempted to smash through a second time. She ignored the rugged rogue's antsy mood.

"We're almost done, just one...more!" Ren heaved with his gust, lugging on the stone and hurling it upward. The trio adjusted to lower it again.

"You all look like you could use some feathers." Niddler proudly proclaimed as he fanned up to perch on top of the solid mass before the team brought it down, crossing his arms. The shelf underneath shattered with the boulder that the exploring triad was holding, and it fell through. Ioz immediately let go and snagged onto the wall, as did the regality. However, Tula did not loosen her grasp in time and plunged down the avenue to the cavern below.

"Tula!" Niddler screeched, flapping his wings above the entrance to the gorge in an alarmed state. If his beloved teammate was harmed, he wouldn't forgive himself.

"I'm okay, Niddler! There's nothing but water down here, but it's a bright green!" Tula's shouted reply amplified in return. Encouragingly, she had landed with a splash. She could barely see herself, the water made her flesh tinge a deep forest. The only definite beam shone from the exitway, which dissolved into the far height above her. The rush she wafted in was fantastic, as well as soothing.

"Huh?" Ren let out a gesture of surprise.

"Chungo lungo, we better go after her!" Ioz straightly roused as he dove through, feet first. Ren glanced around the cove, his eyes fixed on the map and he picked it up. He put it away in his vest and jumped in after the pirate.

"Might as well follow." Niddler indolently crowed and fluttered his wings in the air, he dipped toward the source of clatter to search for Tula and his colleagues.

Ioz and Ren hit the water below with a big splatter, landing right next to Tula. Niddler soared above, not wishing to get wet.

"Huh? It feels strange Tula. It feels like my arms aren't giving me any more pain, and I no longer feel tired." Ren confessed with an evolving awe. He was able to see Tula by a bright glim in the brook, but the surrounding area was a sweeping blackness. He extended his arms, inspecting them. "The rope marks, they're gone!" The flaxen boy gleamed at his arms in astonishment.

"And I felt better as soon as I fell in here!" Tula observed and wondered, no longer feeling fatigued or worn-down. "This water must have some kind of healing properties." The black-haired beauty swept her locks and ushered for Niddler to join in, who remained too nervous to try.

"Chungo lungo! I feel as new as a Janda-town dock-rat after winning a highstakes reef-toss!" Ioz heartily chuckled a greedy laugh, feeling free as a child as he swam closer toward the two in rejoice.

"You should come in Niddler! You'll feel a lot better!" Tula crooned to the full-winged avian, who was flying in circles above.

"Thanks, Tula, but I'll stay out here. I don't like getting wet." The monkeybird courteously rejected her offer. Though he unluckily did not tolerate water, he felt himself beginning to exhaust.

"We need to find where to go, there has to be something besides this river here." Ren extruded as he trudged through the shoulderhigh depth of green, clutching the Compass in his hand. It ignited with its normal effulgence, but it did not point anywhere. "It's not responding, the Treasure has to be down here." He would be confounded by the lack of response from the jewel. "Noy jitat! Why are we having such a difficult time finding it?" The prince clenched his teeth in frustration.

"That is because you already have." The mysterious overture rung from a shaded portion of the chamber. Scarcely seeable to the adventurers, two bodies redeemed from the hermetic shore of the hued river. One, completely concealed, carried a torch. The other and the evident source of the veracious phrase seemed to be an aged and slim form with visible hair of white, she was cloaked in grim robing.

PART 2 - The New Light

"Who are you, woman? What do you want?" Ioz antagonized the new visitor, scouring her suspiciously and demanding response.

"Quiet your tongue, fool pirate! Show respect for Lady Avagon!" The voice beside the woman resonated, the unknown partisan stripped away the hood on his crest to reveal himself as the map-bearer from Kalinda.

"Avagon?!" Ren and Niddler stumbled the name at the same interval, eyes and mouths gaping and dropping open with a breathless disbelief. Doing a doubletake, the lad and the monkeybird turned in a daze at each other, and then at the subject of their astoundment. The reunion wrought a long pause.

"But we thought you were-" Ren began in a sharp stammer, then was cut off.

Avagon collapsed the cloak that covered her head, revealing her full identity which was unmistakably Avagon. "Dead? No. Though by definition, I should have been." Avagon answered only sparsely, vague and frank. "Come ashore." She beckoned to them all. Ren started toward her, Tula and Ioz following after. The viridian overflow became shallow as the crew receded. The monkeybird came down for a landing next to the new company to at last rest his flight muscles. "How goes the Quest?" With both light and fortitude in her eyes Avagon besought of the heir. She leaned toward him so he could transparently see her.

Ren stepped to front her, not believing his eyes. He put a hand forward her face, trying to see if she was real. "How did you survive? Only because of your sacrifice we escaped from Bloth when Tula traded him the 1st Treasure of Rule...so she could free Teron the Supreme Ecomancer, but after Bloth threw you overboard the Maelstrom into the dark-We thought the dark water swallowed you up!" The young prince's bright eyes of blue were still as wide as a dagron's when he sought details of her, not trusting what he was seeing. He swallowed his shock. "I've collected eight of the Thirteen Treasures, the 9th has led me here. I seek to find it." He explained his saga apace.

"It did, Ren, and that is the only reason I ended up here. When the Dark Dweller, my captor, was forced to leave his domain." Avagon commenced to clarify as Ren lowered his hand, he retreated it partially to his trunk.

"But how? Why?" Ren questioned the old mentor and spendid leader of his saving mutiny, the first disciple who told him Always The Quest. He silenced because a thousand curiosities flooded his mind and he could not thresh them all into words at once.

"Only you would know that, Ren. Whatever you have done, it frightened the Dark Dweller and thus allowed my escape. The Dark Dweller was keeping me captive, he believed I knew something about the Quest and your whereabouts, the Dweller's ploy was to trick you later on. After that failed, he planned to make me into one of his dreadful disciples...wanting a steadfast spirit! However, because of what you did, the Dark Dweller needed to draw all his energy in one place. He then could no longer keep me. After I was released from the sea, I drifted here and I've been here since. I did not know when you would return. Loren here was looking for you, he informed me that he had helped you, and that Bloth was hunting for you! He told me that you would soon be coming here, that I should stay instead of leave as I had planned." Avagon signaled for the man standing next to her to speak.

"It's an honor to finally make your acquaintance formally, Son of Primus." Loren virtuously greeted Ren, showing him a dignified bow as he shook his hand.

"Loren is the youngest child and most devoted son of his father, Mizar, who was one of your father's most faithful council." The blanched-haired survivor illustrated, motioning to Loren.

"Do you remember the Treasure found in the seas of Biperia, Ren?" Loren queried of the prince with dignity.

Ren revolved back to the previous venture, there were a few of the Treasures he found in the water. One of them was when he and his friends had encountered the baby leviathan, and the other right after they left Andorus and before they met and would be captured by Cray, that woman who never resolved her feelings for his father. "Yes. Yes I do." Ren's memory was retreating to him as he respectfully resolved Loren's interest.

"That Treasure was my Father's charge to hide. He had said that the leviathans don't usually disturb the muck on the ocean floor-not even the ones with forlorn mouths." Loren indicated a humorous side, gleaning his listener an ardent smile.

Ren took all this in and recollected all his travels. It took a moment before he realized the man's lame joke, but then he politely returned the gesture. "Where is my place in all this? What shall I do now?" Ren considered as he formally lowered his head at the two, showing respect and being careful not to speak out of turn. Tula and Niddler stood at his side, also bowing their heads and listened in regardful manner. Ioz stalled protectively with arms crossed, at the ready and paying attention to the elder aide and her partner.

"Raise your head, Ren, we are the ones who will bow to you. What you need to do now is to find out what you did to make the Dark Dweller retreat from his domain. Only you, and you alone, know what it is. It is the only way to destroy the dark water's hold for good, even after you find all Thirteen Treasures." Avagon urged, laying a palm on the youth's shoulder. "Try to remember, you are the only one who can." She continually advised, near to his side.

Ren tried and tried again to remember something, anything, but he couldn't. "My memory is failing, Avagon, I can't..." Ren at last informed, driving his mind. He remembered the fight on the Maelstrom, being thrown to the Constrictus. Then escaping from Bloth's ship and hitting the water. That was the last thing he recalled. It had not been until long after he woke up next to a half-comatose monkeybird. Niddler was safe but in no condition to do much and neither had he been. "I'm sorry, Avagon, I really can't." He gave up finally, then gritting his teeth in frustration. He didn't believe he had done anything intentional.

"Patience, Ren. This is what the Dark Dweller wanted, he wanted to make you forget whatever you have gained. You need not remember it now, but you must, once all the Treasures have been found." Avagon told as she poised up and tall, beckoning for Ren to stand up straight as well. "When you know, you will know how to use it." The sagacious matron settled with affirmation.

"Wait, Avagon." Tula started as something came to her mind. "The Great Wave, that huge seastorm. Do you mean to say the Dark Dweller played a part in this?" She conscientiously invoked the older woman.

Avagon seemed perplexed. "It is probable but I cannot say it is fact. Loren has told me of what he has seen, the Great Wave was viewed from many corners of Mer. The time I escaped and the time the tidal twister was seen coincided. It is too peculiar to not be in correlation, if I were one to judge." Avagon suggested rationally. Tula was unsettled by this information, even Ioz appeared to be just as much. "The talk of a Dark Water Backlash has rooted on the Kalinda Coast by the words of Loren. I can say it is unfortunate that such an event may happen again, until the rest of the Treasures are found." Her leery words were stark, but Avagon couldn't keep her doubts about certain ideas closed-off.

"Dark water...Backlash?" Tula awfully dispelled. Avagon regrettably acceded.

"Chungo lungo." Ioz cursed over a faint grimness.

"I hate to interrupt, but where is the next Treasure now?" Niddler meekly pondered, the monkeybird worried he might intrude upon something important.

"The Treasure? The Treasure is right here, Loyal Monkeybird Niddler." Avagon established with a smile.

"But that means..." Tula wavered to enter the dialogue between the others, but Avagon finished up.

"Correct. This entire river is a Treasure of Rule." Avagon verified from the tips of her fingers to the shining flow of the opaque mist above the healing water, extending her arm toward the immaculate river as if to showcase. "Amazing, isn't it? This was the mythical place that Primus had long sought to uncover when he and his Seven Captains were on the original Quest, seventeen years ago while you were in the Lighthouse of Octopon. It is also the only place on Mer that can not be entirely destroyed by the dark water, thus serving as a safe haven from the cruel substance. The legend says that after the Treasures dispersed, a single Treasure of Rule liquefied into a pure body of water, becoming like a river. It was never found, but your father had tried, Ren. Quite possibly, he even knew it existed without ever making it here himself." Avagon revealed to the group the unbelievable notion, to which met with mystified gazes. She summoned word of the only good within the present position. No news would be totally well-off.

"Ay chunga, that sounds impossible." Ioz spelled a sign of stupor, dubiously stunned. His many days sailing the twenty seas had brought him plenty a tale, this one wasn't any different...at first.

"Aye, it does, but this place is very real. This Treasure of Rule has amazing powers, and when you fell through to the water, you experienced it for yourself." The mentor contrived a languid testament. "I speak from my amazement after I was strewn through here." She tamely outlined further.

"So that's why I felt a lot better when I was in the water, and that's why the Compass wouldn't hone in on it!" Ren was incredibly surmounted upon coming to a superb realization.

"Yes. Loren has told me he has given you a map, is this true, Ren?" Avagon intriguingly studied her recipient, affirming the youthful lad's deduction. She heeded his next claim.

"Yes!" Ren vivified with animation, Avagon's words spurring him to action, and he redeemed the document from his tunic. He handed it to her. She then unfurled the scroll and took a gander at it.

"Of course! So Primus knew this place existed." Avagon judged with conviction, she eyed the writing on the solitary enlargement of Arakna island. "Interesting..." Under a doleful standing she droned, the watchful eye of her guests searching. "This is definitely one of his maps. Not even I knew that he knew about this exact spot back then." She concluded after a curtailed monitor, releasing the map to Ren. Avagon was aware Loren had given her one yuugla of a fish-story, nothing like this.

"It was my father's map? Then what about the writing? I read it, but I couldn't make any sense of it at all." Ren solicited his succeeding matter, accepting his chart and putting it back in its proper place.

"Most likely, it was your father's attempt to cover what he truly knew. Perhaps it reads like gibberish because he wanted anyone who found it to dismiss it as being the notes of a madman, a riddle yet to be deciphered. Thanks to Loren and the wary devising of his father, this map was recovered. The state of your Father's untimely capture and the fact that he knew about the existence of The River of Rule makes me wonder whether his encounter with Bloth was a consequence of the dark water knowing of his coveted achievement." Avagon sustained a theory as Ren tried to take in everything she had said.

"This is nice to know Avagon, but I'm not sure how we're going to be able to carry an entire River back to Octopon." Niddler distressingly boggled, rationally leery and gawking up at the wise woman with uncertainty. Ioz and Tula signaled in agreement as the primate bird asked the question on everyone's mind.

Avagon attended to the monkeybird. "Ah, you make a good point, but unfortunately that is a decision the Prince of Octopon has to make." She broke a delay of austerity, then turned to confront Ren.

"Decision?" Ren disputed, taken aback by the statement that did not make any sense. "Haven't I already made my decision to pursue the Treasures of Rule to save Octopon?" He paused. "And Merr?" The boy lingered, not quite comprehending what she was getting at.

"To gather them? Yes, you have already taken that upon yourself. However, in order to take this Treasure, you will face a decision much greater. To claim it will involve giving up something more. You see, this Treasure will share it's gift with you but you will have to drink the water, as the lore speaks. Only then can you possess the Treasure in your hands. When you do, this place will be no more. However, the choice at hand has nothing to do with this, to take this Treasure of Rule you will have to give up your ability to die by unnatural means. Drinking this water, Ren, will make you invincible." Avagon culminated on a heavy lead, staring rigorously into the vision of the tender prince. Warning crept into her voice.

"Invincible? Ay chunga! Drink the water, quick, Ren! I don't believe it, but we can use all the help we can get against Bloth!" Ioz's eyes swelled in excitement, racing in urgency. He ushered Ren toward the water the moment she had finished. "By Daven's beard I would give my left arm for such an opportunity!" The tall pirate abducted the stunned royal's hand, trailing him forward to the emerald stream. Ren eyed Avagon with confusion and restraint as if awaiting, and then swung back to the creek.

"Stop! Don't act so quick and foolishly, young one." Avagon commanded evenly as she hurtled to Ren and lashed a guarding hand between him and the River. She rushed into his sightline, which struggled to fathom everything he had been told by far. "You didn't let me finish, I first must warn you. If you drink the water now, the power of the Treasure will reside in you and infuse into your very being. Like the Treasures dispel the dark water, it will protect you from all manner of almighty harm done to you. Though you will live far beyond your years, you will not be immortal. However, because it is within your Spirit it will not be able to stop the dark water from possessing you. Though you may not die by the sword, you may die a thousand deaths without ever dying once, should the dark water take a hold on you. Your fear is becoming possessed or corrupted, being forced to watch as everything you care about is destroyed. Or, you may become perpetuated by the dark water and your mind will no longer be your own. No one has ever vied for and been able to claim this Treasure since the Black Tide broke free from the depths of Mer. It has many strange and unknown powers. Choosing to claim it will be one of the greatest risks you will take during your Quest." Avagon paraphrased with a sense of constraint in her words. She focused on Ren, who stewed with the information. "The choice is yours, this River will remain here until you take the Treasure that resides within it. You may come for it after you have recovered the other Treasures, if you are undecided. However, should someone else find this place, they too can claim the Treasure of Rule." Avagon relinquished the verbatim guidance imparted to her by another, leaving Ren to speculate.

"Avagon, you've told me so much and it's so hard...so hard to imagine it actually happening. To think that my father, The King of Octopon, knew such powers existed..." Ren replied softly, instilled with reserve. He peered downward, seeming torn and preoccupied in light of this new information.

"Avagon, isn't there any other way? What if someone else drank from the River and gave the Treasure to Ren?" Niddler entreated the resilient woman, concerned for his consternate friend and trying to find any possible way to lighten the situation.

"I'm afraid not. If someone else were to drink from the River of Rule and possess the Treasure, though they may, they would not be able to properly use it without the other part within the true owner. If Ren makes his decision to take this Treasure, it is almost certain that he will used by the enemy should his fringes of mortality ever be found out." Avagon renounced, her words expelled a grave and dire air. "However, all hope is not lost. So long as young Ren manages to keep this power hidden from the enemy, he will be safe." She ended her piece, leaving them to await the courageous seeker's decision.

"Ren..." Tula empathetically leaned on Ren's arm as she watched his lowered head and down-turned scrutiny. Standing nearby, Ioz put his hand on Ren's shoulder. Niddler pattered over and rustled at the side, wing feathers brushing against the form of his guardian.

"Do what you want to, buddy." Ioz gently whispered, absolutely meaning it. Ren didn't look up.

"I don't know what to think Avagon. If I don't take this now, then there's a possibility someone else will. If I do, then it's possible I could betray someone by no choice of my own." Ren contemplated his choices, pondering his quandary with the witness of his confidant. "I have no choice. I'm the only one who can do this, and I have to. I have to take the risk for the good of Mer and Octopon. I'll do it, Avagon." He professed to her with the fire of dedication and surety in his eyes.

"Indeed, you are truly your father's heir." Avagon praised Ren, arranging a hand on the courageous prince's shoulder and giving him a smile of admiration. She then traced away from him to gather a bowl. She retrieved it and brought it up, Loren helping to hold one side as they filled it with the green purity of the Treasure of Rule. Presenting it to Ren, she supported as he cupped it in his hands. Ren braced the dish after bringing it to his mouth, his focused gaze shocked with an intensity as he took a sip of the Treasure that would become a part of him.

His eyes lit up as he placed the bowl down. He felt the flash of energy that greatly empowered him.

"Good. Now, it's time to collect the Treasure to take to Octopon." Avagon led Ren down to the water. "Now, gather your hands and try to draw in the River."

She instructed.

Ren consolidated his aim toward his hands as he closed his eyes. To his surprise, the circulating splendor was pooling toward his palms and he could sense it. He could feel it condensing, becoming thicker. Eventually, heavier in his hands. It became immense, so much that he could have dropped it. When he cracked his eyes, the River had entirely vanished. He was cradling a huge and very dense orb of green tinge in his hands. "So this is it." He idled with the sphere for a moment, frozen upon his account of loyalty.

"Yes. Congratulations, Ren, the 9th Treasure of Rule is now in your hands. From this day onward, you are anointed as forevermore the true heir to the throne of Octopon." Avagon leaned down, reassuring with a palming shoulder as she stayed her counsel on the boy. She ministered to him carefully. "Remember, Ren, your enemies cannot know that you have this power. If they are to find out, terrible things will surely come. Even though you may not die in combat, you must fight as if your life is on the line. If the Dark Dweller finds out about your weakness, I am sure he will try to imprison you as if you were one of the Treasures yourself. If Bloth finds out, he will try to manipulate it to his favor. I have no doubt the next four Treasures will be even harder to retrieve, many more dangers lie ahead of you. I am not able to help you with those." Avagon resumed her pose after helping Ren up by the arm, who was in a drudge to retain the compressed Treasure. The crystalline enigma displayed and handled much like an iron weight.

"Well, Ren?" Tula edged forward with a dilatory response. She waited close to Ren as the young man roved over, wobbling with the massive Treasure.

"We're ready to go, I have the Treasure." Ren ascertained with faith in himself, holding the bulky gem in both arms.

"Need a hand, Ren?" Ioz crossed over and relieved him of the burdensome Treasure. "Chungo lungo, this is heavy." He allayed as he carried it in an embrace, stunned at its gravity.

"Well it was a whole river." Tula stalled with a savvy smile.

"There's an alternative way out of here, but it's at the very end of the riverbed. You'll have to follow a long path up to the lofts of the caverns, that is the safest way through. You will not be able to get back up the way you came with the Treasure in hand. Once you reach the end, it will lead to the shore of the island. You should find your ship somewhere along there." Avagon earnestly disclosed, she bowed close to the noble adolescent. "Remember there's a lot more you need to learn still. About your past and about your father, King Primus, and your Mother. Many will try to hinder you, but many will give you aid as well." She conferred her speech with the young sojourner.

"My mother?" Ren gleamed at her reference attentively, wanting to know more.

"Yes, she figured very prominently in Octopon. Follow your Quest and these things will be known." Avagon staunchly revealed, peering at the purposeful youth. "Now, you need to get back to your Quest." The judicious attendant enclosed an arm around the boy's shoulders, ushering him and his friends toward the exitway of the long waterbed.

"Won't you join us Avagon? With as much as you know about Ren's Quest, you could really be of help to us." Tula fruitfully suggested, showing dignity for the seniority of the King's consultant as Ren nodded with agreement.

"Yes, please join us Avagon." The prince humbly invited the fearless elder in response.

Avagon bent down and gently brushed Tula's hair from her face. "I'd like to, dear, but unfortunately I cannot, I'm needed elsewhere. I have stayed in this place for as long as I could and should have, and I've accomplished my purpose to assist Primus's son and his devoted companions. Keep strong, young one, I know you will take good care of Ren." She beamed at Tula, blessing her with a shoulder hug. The ecomancer revivified a smile. "Ren." The beckoning aide lapsed to a rested palm, again speaking. "Your father's spirit is strong within you, I know you will make a wonderful King. Stand up tall." She delivered a similar hold and then stood back. "Now I don't have time to explain everything you need to know about what is ahead of you. I can however tell you that you will want to head North of here, should you wish to know more. Loren and I need to look more into Primus's Quest, there is more still yet to be discovered about the Treasures of Rule but I'm sure we will meet again soon." She motioned to the man beside her, who also bid Ren adieu.

Loren approached Ren. "I am graced to have met you, Son of Primus, may you have fortune in your Quest and meet the success your father and his Righteous Seven yearned for. May the seas smile upon and bless you in your journey, and may your enemies fall to the tide." The captain honored the future king a respectful bow then made his way to Avagon's side to join her.

Avagon briefly tarried as Ren and his team collected to traverse for the tunnel. "Farewell, Ren. Remember, Always the Quest!" The white-haired lady of the origins strew her final words as she separated from the prince and his loyal crew in the barren and now Riverless caves.


	4. Hearsay

Chapter 3

HEARSAY

Part 1 - Zoolie's indolence

The enigmatic ceiling in the lofts of the chamber hung over a riverless waterbed. The air was silent, only being broken by the chatter of four figures tinkering their passage through the winding tunnel.

"Where in Kuunda's Kingdom is this jitatan exit? We've been walking forever." The broad-muscled man who was bringing up the rear of the group expressed in weariness.

"Hopefully not that much longer, Ioz. Niddler didn't reach the end when he was scouting. Be fortunate we aren't coming across any monsters." The woman's melody in the traveling bundle confirmed, only dimly lit by an uncanny radiance of green that filled the nearby area. "Good thing it works like a lamp." She dispensed a merry laugh and smile at the tall pirate, who was grumbling.

"We'd go faster if one of us wasn't walking so slow!" The insinuatory note of a spastic avian-primate yammered through the bare passageway.

"Why don't you carry it for a while, monkeybird!" The buccaneer hollered back in irritation.

"Break it up, you two. It will be easier to go out this way than the way we came in, like Avagon said. The end isn't far. We'll reach it faster if we don't stop." The younger male conversed assuredly as he trudged with momentum, leading onward.

"Maybe it would be a good idea to try out that new trick of yours instead, Ren." Ioz driveled with displeasure. His arms were sore from handling the profound orb.

"I'll pass." Ren flatly trammeled Ioz's hint. He sighed and rolled his eyes to the gemstone in the arms of the tough travelmate. His dreary mind fixated on the previous collection of the 9th Treasure, something that felt like a surreal dream. Ever since he had been lumbering on through this starless wasteland, he never truly believed he possessed part of the Treasure within him. However, he certainly did not want to put his invincibility to the test, definitely not when it wasn't necessary.

"Don't we wish all the Treasures were this easy to find. Now, when do we eat?" Niddler skittered through the distended silence, letting out a sarcastic quip. He posed with the fuzzy part of his shut fists on his haunches, needlessly complaining.

"It's only going to get harder, Niddler." The prince intelligibly added as he continued through the ever-snaking path, scanning athwart the idleness for any sign of clearing. He did not feel very fatigued himself, but his crew was and they were starting to wear on his mood. He was not sure how much time had elapsed since they started roving without any sign of the channel wanning or changing at all, but he agreed with Ioz's correct declaration. It did feel like forever.

"Did you have to say that?" The vocal avian whined once more, sharpness minced in his pitch.

"Ay jitata! Shut your beak monkeybird, you're not even doing any work!" The grumpy wrangler from the Tayhoj isles kicked out a leg at the nearby and noisy mess of feathers that were illuminated by the emerald sphere. Niddler angrily chattered and jet up to perch upon Ren's shoulders.

"Ioz, stop it!" Ren ordered pointedly, swiveling abaft to meet his moody shiphand.

"Tell that to the jitatan monkeybi-" Ioz argued, intent to say Niddler started the whole thing.

"I don't care. Give the Treasure to me, I'll carry it." Just as the prince twisted to mediate to his exasperated friends, a source of tropical white peeked through the gravel.

"Scot tunga! Look, Ren! I see a light!" Tula cried out as she pointed at the source of the brilliance, which seemed to be sprouting from a pithy crevice. She sprung forward.

"Ay chungo chipungo! Finally!" Ioz buoyantly vented, carefully placing the Treasure at his heel as he and the teen boy dashed to the spilling glimmer about a length away. He surveyed the source of the shine and discovered it to be a fragile crack in the enclosure. Taking his sword, he lifted up and thunked it against the splintering wall, which broke the fold in a startling roar. The monkeybird, who had flown down to guard the Treasure, chimed a bewildered squawk. The split now emerged, but nigh big enough.

"I can finish this up." Tula slowly avowed as she knelt down and evoked her trance, she closed her eyes and braced her temples. Gradually, the breaches in the mineral barrier began to open to a fuller one. She supported her hands on her thighs, head lowered in attempt to catch her breath.

"Good job, Tula!" Ren rushed back, praising gleefully and conferring the ecomancer a gracious smile. He grabbed the Treasure, picking it up. He gingerly channeled his way through the aperture in the cave, paying mind not to trip with his wares.

"Thanks woman!" Ioz brusquely muttered, too irritable to care for manners as he plowed toward the demolished flint. The fluffy primate-bird scooped up Tula and toted her through the jagged and rocky exit, dropping her gently on the pile of ocean-smooth stones outside. "Ah, to be out in the salty air again!" Ioz reveled. "If I were in those jitatan caves any longer I would've forgotten what it smelled like." He savored the breeze, the air was a sweet and fresh taste of the sea. It appeared to be about midmorning, close to noontime. "Where's the ship?" He directed to Ren with befuddlement as he wheeled around, not spying the reddened vehicle.

"You were right Ioz, this is hard to carry any distance." The young lead concurred, in agreement with his peer. He found the large bead to be awkward. It did not wear him out to carry it, nor did it give him any trouble other than causing an implementation to his speed. "Avagon said it would be somewhere near the exit." Ren dutifully advanced to his fellow crewman. Gandering at the waterways, he recognized the area but his wandering eyes did not meet anything of interest. "I know Niddler and I docked here!" Ren contested. He did not understand why he could not find the Wraith where it was, he was able to view the island hanging back from a long pathway. In the visible distance, a flashy disturbance protruded through what he could see of the skyline. It could be none other than the ship. "There! It's that way." Ren announced too soon when he gathered his pace for the vessel. He lagged on foot with the vast Treasure.

"It's as heavy as a jitatan chain-ball. Ay chunga! What's that on the horizon? There's something moving, by the Wraith!" Ioz frantically slammed out, his peaceful demeanor rapidly going into a dire state of frenzy. "Quick!" His eyes spread with alarm as Ren saw it too. The panicked helmsman sprinted in the direction of the Wraith, the banking verge of the island.

"Noy jitat! That's dark water! We need to get the Treasure to it! Hurry Niddler!" Ren's agitated words screamed to his companion across from him, who was jammed by a pillar of quarry behind him. The monkeybird had only begun to enjoy a state of rest.

Oh no, Niddler envisioned. This couldn't be happening to him now. "I'm coming!" Niddler called out, he halted instantaneously. Then he jumped up from off the ground, flapping his wings to get a headstart. He glided down to ferry Ren, who latched on to the Treasure with a pair of arms. He flew as hastily as his wings would permit but he was dragging more than normal due to the extra baggage. He began to pant from weariness when he fluttered with all his might, aware of the severity of the circumstance. He was able to reach the impeccable muck in time, salvageable moments before it pulled the stern of the fire hull down with it. Ren slid the artifact into a black density of ocean-born gunk, deftly enabling hands out of the hazard as it reached out with lashes. The soulless substance then foamed into purple gook and dissipated. Ioz and Tula arduously plodded ahead to catch up, squeezing for breath. Niddler flapped his grand wings and hovered to the solid terrain for a repose, close to falling from his airborne situate.

"Any longer and we would have had to swim." Expelled an overextended Ioz as he sheltered his sword, which he adhered to in preparation for any inkling of danger. Straightly by his side was the enchantress, who decisively had achieved enough excitement to decimate any previous indolence.

"Who is that steering the Wraith?" Ren spotted a stranger loosening the riggings on the wheel, who was seeking bolt out as he noticed the prince's yells. The athletic captain's arms scaled the anchor, in attempt to impede the hijacker from setting sail.

"The name is Nimbo." Nimbo welcomed Ren with a scowl underneath a red seastar-patch and the raise of his mace, he splashed on to the boy's quarrel. He drew a strung longbow as he swaggered forward and loaded a starfished arrow from his quiver, his marksmanship excelled although his target was not a body. Ren wobbled and maneuvered his half-blade. Instead, the thief flew above to the hold and gathered a plentiful net. He then took off to soar among the clouds.

"There goes our food supply." Tula straightly observed with a sigh, the green-bristled man faded into the horizon.

"Hey! Come back!" Niddler screeched to desist but he could not catch up by air, the speedy archer was gone fast as the hover in Nimbo's feet whooshed loose.

"It's gone now." Ren hurried his eyes to watch for any new travails, but at last digressed to his steady condition. He hopped aboard deck, moving progressively with Treasure in arms. He secured it in a small compartment nearing the stern of the ship, then resumed at the wheel.

"Let's hope that was the last of it." Tula sluggishly wished as she clambered up to the planking from the fringe, a worn Ioz traced.

"Great. Now we can push off and leave this jitatan island. You coming monkeybird?" Ioz heaved onto the barge and shouted to Niddler's viewpoint, he reclined against the mast to recover his airflow. With diligence Niddler arrested from flying and pad for the vessel. The monkeybird levitated and ascended upward as the craft trailed away from the cagey shoal. He flopped his feathers down as he soon came to a placement against the barrier of the maindeck.

"Phew. I don't remember the last time I've flown so much." Niddler numbly prattled, beat like his fellows. Perhaps he was tried even more so because he did not enter the River back in the caverns, he started to regret denying the privilege.

Ren fooled with the Compass, exploring as it infused with a beam. "Look, it's pointing North, just like Avagon said! She said I would find out more North of here, but I wonder if she knew whether it would be my next destination." He enthusiastically cranked the wheel as he began trilling and thinking about all the questions to the answers he wanted to know.

"Ren, I don't know about you, but I feel like chunga-lungan shipwreck." Ioz muttered as he leaned against the mast, his lids were half-closed when he bluntly made his position known.

"For once Ioz is right, Ren. I think we need to take a break before we find any more Treasures." Tula extensively recoiled, her lateral against the cabin. She appeared as if she would fall asleep in the time it would take the colleague to respond.

"And my wings feel like they're going to fall off!" Niddler hummed weakly, sinking with a tired caw.

Ren considered everything he encountered and concluded he did not feel very curbed by the excursion. "I guess maybe when I took that Treasure, it gave me more stamina than before." Ren pondered truthfully, arising to the unlucky grasp.

"Great, and you better follow the old woman's advice and not show it. We need to go to another port where we can take a break." Ioz smoothly recommended, receding the mast he loitered by and walking toward Ren. "How about Janda-town? I think a nice night of entertainment at Zoolie's might be just what I need to get my seafaring spirit back! Maybe we'll even win some more restocking funds, and maybe a little extra for the run?" The pirate winked as he greedily suggested the solution. He collected a sly smile and a chuckle. He pulled the wheel from Ren, who then caved.

"I guess you're right, Ioz. We should take a break." Ren statically agreed, he seemed listless as he consented. He feared maybe he had made a mistake. He needed to gather the Treasures of Rule before his enemies could get their hands on them, now he felt like this journey was going to be longer than he had ever imagined. He still had not found out as much as he wanted to know. He couldn't sleep, he was not even tired. He desired to push on. Perhaps he should have forfeited and returned to collect the 9th Treasure. He plastered down to the jetty and peered over the continual sea. The turquoise waves would peak and decline in a ceaseless cycle, as they always had, but now this natural movement was ever impossibly slow for him. During the duration of his Quest, he never remembered experiencing anything contiguous to boredom. This day, the wind's supple pelt of the Wraith's tacking cloth over the grand mast would capture his excitement. Seeing nothing else for him to do in the immediate, he promenade to the newly found Treasure and sat to meditate as Tula and Niddler rested in the cabin while Ioz steered them ahead to Janda-town. He bumbled at a noise.

"Ren! I wasn't supposed to eat this, was I?" Niddler tripped over to Ren, disarranged in form and behavior.

"No, Niddl-what?! Amazing!" The prince scolded as he jerked to his feet, but was instantly walloped back to his seating. He soothed his forehead, pushing away the sand-colored hair. He was now looking upon a magnificent shape.

"Niddler, you're not supposed to be eating out of the emergency-supplyhold! Those are necessities only! What under the great moons of Merr-" Ioz critically rebuked the transgressing rascal, until he witnessed what would become of his flying contact.

"I thought it was something good to eat, we're low on food! Huh?" Niddler belted an enormous squawk. Astoundingly, he had raised at least double his previous stature. The jumbo monkeybird could have taken up a quarter of the Wraith with his afresh wingspan.

"Chungo lungo." Ren only uttered, astounded as he stepped minimal paces away. He gaped up at the marvelous phenomenon.

"Is everything in order? I heard shouting. Niddler where did you-" Tula reemerged from her chamber, fluently jogging in pursuit. She laid eyes on Niddler. "Niddler? What on Merr happened to you?" She blundered over the gigantic avian standing before her. On to the bridge and down to the maindeck she staggered.

"I don't know!" Niddler crowed uncomfortably. "Something in that bottle must have done it, but I honestly didn't mean to! I just wanted some food!" Niddler exposed his anxiety as he hunched below to prospect his shrunken friends. He fluffed his swelling wings, almost bludgeoning Ren to the wood tier once more. "Sorry Ren!" He earnestly apologized, a shame now drizzling over his measly disposition.

"No hard feelings, I'm just surprised. I've never heard of anything like this happening before, there's nothing on Merr I know of that makes you into a giant if you consume it. I wonder if it can be reversed." Ren didn't phrase words very well, speechlessly finding himself awed by the sudden transformation.

"That's not the only problem we have everyone! Look!" Tula outcried as her fluid arm set on an approaching boater in the water, a bitty dinghy but one significant.

"Konk! Where is Bloth?" Ren flew on flitting boots from his mounted perspective, he issued a biting word at the aggravating debacle. With a glare, he readied. His scowl set on the peg-legged minion.

"Piglet is going to be disappointed because we're not sticking around! Let's have that sail up!" Ioz yelled the call for a chase, Tula and Ren assumed the defensive.

The slacking scout-vessel declined into the beyond after the minor course change taken by the Wraith, then it waxed closer. Konk's skeletal mini-ship snaked in a miserable pathway, ultimately touching the berm.

"We're carrying too much." Ioz told by misfortune, a distressed expectation pronged at the monkeybird. Konk was already preparing to board.

"Just peachy!" Niddler wouldn't waste time in this spot, but he did believe he could make the situation worse. He jumbled to the starboard, feeling as if his inborn glider was too chunky for his body. "Take your ship out to sea, pig-face!" He chanted for the cantankerous villain. Swatting forward, he bit Konk on the extent of a grubby hand. His stupendous jaw that could have lopped would surely cause a surrender. The cunning midget yowled, and minced his tawny stare at the monkeybird who had chomped him.

"Uh oh, monkeybird must have eat Surge in bottle." The rotund raider could be seen splashing from the ledge after the endangering trespass. However, the tricky one had hooked an attachment onto the railing abaft. Another massive abnormality was now equipped to fight. Konk charged at the resisting troupe, intent on laying siege to the auburn craft.

"Scot pango! By the two moons, Konk is inflated like Niddler! Protect the Treasure!" Ioz peeked on, dumbstruck and drastic. He bolted from his fortification with the flash of a shining armament.

"Don't worry Ioz, I've got this one!" The oversized Niddler returned. He wrestled with the man who boasted but a few feathers on his height. With a grunt, the noteworthy Konk shoved for victory, set on pushing Niddler on his back. Niddler headbutt the conspicuous foe. "You think just because you're not a piglet anymore, you can intimidate us?" With another caw, Niddler stretched to a majestic flight from crest to flank. He was dazzled to learn he could draft his own weight when he shuffled the portable ex-runt into the air and issued a removal, ejecting Konk into the tide antecedent to the diminutive skiff.

"Barnacle-blasted monkeybird! I be back for you and Treasure!" Konk grumblingly swore as he remounted his dory and hied away.

"Not too shabby, Niddler. Whatever was in that bottle was a blessing to us, but now we have to worry about that gelatinous gantha-pig coming back." For once, Ioz praised the pair of wings as he situated at his station and swerved back on route. He observed the rainbow avian who at half-mast, currently matched his shoulder.

"I don't think anyone has asked my say in this!" Niddler murmured, fussing as he neared Tula. By chance, the distant feathers on his back wiped against her arm. The monkeybird touched a spark, then his vision became blurred. The proportion he previously carried himself began to diminish. He felt dizzy, at last metamorphosing to a normalized mass. "I'm back! Tula, what did you do?" He puzzled as he footed to face the startled ecomancer. His state was corrected.

"I don't know, Niddler. I guess my control of nature gave you a boost, like it did with the wingless monkeybirds on Mobo Island. Only in the opposite direction..." Tula hypothesized over her influence. Her ecomantic powers had worked before, but that was by accident when she reversed the effects of the Stecca fog, the peculiar mist stunting wing growth of the resident monkeybirds there. There her touch had transferred by hugging Zena, the new Queen. Visibly, the same happened with Niddler's disfigurement.

"Niddler, we weren't supposed to consume what that woman from Kalinda gave us! It was important, don't you remember?" Ren galloped forward to bestow the extraordinary reminder. His plumed buddy appeared melancholy.

"What was important, Ren?" Tula wondered before either skipper could reciprocate.

"There was a woman in Kalinda who gave us the bottle Niddler ate out of." Ren serenely offered to the confusion. "She said I would find out what it does when I researched it but that I shouldn't use it and was to keep it under containment because it could spread like a sickness, so I put it away. I didn't understand what else she wanted...her language was very, Broken." He muddled over facts.

"Broken?" Tula examined his word.

"Yes. She said it wasn't from her Home, but she made it absolutely clear we shouldn't ever try to eat it. Unfortunately, I didn't think that Niddler would forget about it or bother with it." Ren's reproaching echo rooted on Niddler, his eyes veered to the volatile monkeybird. "I guess I should have put it somewhere else." He chided his own haste.

"I keep saying sorry, why is everyone mad at me! That weird lady just wanted our attention, you know you don't just walk into the town of thieves with bobbed hair and all those adornments. She was probably lying about her alias, but I thought she was crazy!" The warm monkeybird groaned.

"It is peculiar that my ecomancy vanished it's effects." The sable-locked beauty perpetuated. She panned her senses to the almost static wash of the undertow.

"It was still difficult to tell who she was, Niddler. You know you can't wear other people's clothes in Kalinda without being spotted. Unlike one monkeybird I know." Ren wittingly jested with a receptive flyer. "Although, this is the only instance I can remember of something like this happening. I haven't seen anyone like her before, she was surely a woman but she almost reminded me of...Mantus." He improbably deliberated, a recurring judgment somehow finding way into his awareness.

"Mantus?" Tula communed and precisely repeated Ren's comparison. "Are you sure this woman was on our side?" She discredited his reliance on intrigue, sensing trouble.

"That I don't know for sure, but she said her name was Say, from one of Father's captains. This real mystery is what that piglet was doing out here in the middle of the ocean, Bloth isn't anywhere to be seen." Ren unambiguously claimed.

"Land ho! Bentaar is the biggest port-isle between Kalinda and Janda-town! Maybe is this is where that hog sneaked out from and I don't blame him, Bentaarians really know how to party!" Ioz merrily coasted for the bank on the forefront. He rubbernecked at the above fruit-bearing trees, Niddler took flight with a sloppy tongue as the navigator crashed into the shoreline and earned an argument from Tula. Ioz speedily threw down a ladder, but no sooner did he lay his footprint on the hot turf had two twigs pierced the fabric on his hips.

"You're not marring us again, pirates!" Duet shrieks shook and batted the flowered branches until Ioz lost his vise on the rope and planted face-first into sand.

"Chungo lungo!" Ioz scorned as he removed a speck from his eyes. He fleetly revived a drowsy head and gandered at his afraid attackers. "Niddler!" Busting about in a hasty rage, he accused the shrugging flyer.

"This monkeybird will protect us from wicked pirates!" One teen loudly huddled to the avian, another girl who was quiet embraced Niddler as well. Four arms lightly wrapped around a feathery mantle.

"I'd love to! Just, first...would you mind making me a second helping of that Bentaar-Pear cake?" With a hankering coo, Niddler salivated to his dreams.

"What's going on? Why is it already Ioz is scaring women off, and we just arrived." Tula flung off the bow before Ren by a ratty halyard, but when she aligned her shoes next to Ioz's stooping shape she was confronted with narrow glares from twin girls of age before her height.

"Don't come near us, you just want to sell us to your pirate men! We don't have anything you want, now go away!" The taller of the couple screeched and picked up a stone to hurl at the ecomancer.

"But we're not pirates!" Ren insisted as he unwittingly bore down with an awkward sole. The duo only shuddered and screamed as he stepped near, their black coiffures flopped behind shaking leaves of an emerald hedge to hide from sight.

"Isn't that the truth, I haven't felt like a real pirate since I crewed for jitatan Bloth." The brunet twosome all but ducked and ran totally at Ioz's muttering, they loaded a bendable sapling with a sack of clammit-powder.

"Ioz, you're not helping." Tula grunted warningly at her curt chum, she crossed over to brave the bony damsels' decided belief of dissolving blaring noises in the air would scare away any fearsome foe. "I know you fear us but you have nothing to be afraid of, these men are my friends and they wouldn't hurt a fly. I wouldn't either. Please, trust us and let us help you. We mean you no harm, really." She knelt down, delicately waiting for the pair to calm.

"You trust me right? I'm with them!" Niddler cawed as he broached on Tula's hair, spreading his wings in a flashy display. He hopped off to throw a few minga-melons aboard.

"Zago?!" The red-eyed youth raised one of her curious burgundy-eyelids and the brow on her conical face, she halted activity at the confused team.

"Lus-nayi cannot speak Merrian-Common, Quiin-Draconik only. Older sister and I are refugees from Qui-Qua...we lived in Kalinda before our haikspe-our parents were slaughtered by a cold-blooded band of pirates. Those pirates hurt my sister when they broke into our home to steal from us, and they were led by someone from our own tribe with quills bearded-black as coal. I hunched out of the way as they made her kneel. I hid because I knew the same thing would happen to me if I interfered..." The languid speaker sat down to spell a spurned tale, when peering at her tender half she switched dialog as if she were translating.

"I'm sorry such an awful thing became of you, as the Son of King Primus you won't find a single trace of anything plundered on the Wraith under my watch." Ren promised his vigilant greeters, giving Ioz a shuffle of the wink. "If you are in need of transport, we will carry you where you need to go." He volunteered to reach a hand at the differing sets of yellow eyes and crimson irises belonging to twain orphans, of which were abundantly spheroid and silently scanned the gentle lad.

"Sister scurried to fetch our mother's wedding-band when she could have fled because it would have been our only means of survival. I watched it all as they drained her blood. She tried to crawl on her elbows from the binds, but then they kicked her until she couldn't move. They burned down our hut after they had stolen everything of value. The fire would have taken shus-sister, if I hadn't pulled her out. This is how it happened...I was watching outside." The blossomed ladies clung closely as the linguist's golden glance resonated among her older sister's native tongue.

Within the tropical port a sector of insectoid civilians clustered to a halt, the boarders of two outsider ships in the harbor brought gloom this day.

"On Toishok's Deatiny none of your women or little beach-leeches will meet a painful end and all of you may even go free-If...you follow orders! Bring me your gold and everything with a higher trade-value than a Bentaar-pear!" The demanding pirate gnarled a nefarious oath to a sitting circle of townsmen, his polished Sword impending as he patrolled the ring of living bodies.

"What is more valuable than a Bentaar-pear, to you? Do you want our kelp-straw used for feeding our dolphecikhens, our young men's labor? Our livelihood is more valuable than what our people use in one day!" One of the older chiefs bowed in submission, pleading for a more specific task. Through his trembling he feared for his sons and granddaughters.

"Sir. I don't think this is all of it, we've moored the boats in the harbor but the maidens of this isle hide much jewelry in the homes!" One raider rabbled pettily as he emerged with a trunk of expensive materials, heaving it among an accumulating pile of riches surrounding the laborers.

"Noy borga! If Bloth were here this would be already done without question! I am not a pushover to this smool-brained batch of rudder-slime!" The quartermaster palmed his olive forehead with an annoyed huff. His usual coolness resumed as he prowled around the vassals to inspect the hoard of possessions. Sleek feet stopped light of his periwinkle garb, a streaming mass of ebony hair hid a calm patience about to boil over. "Take the Krelikhan-fang to one of their cabins...so they get the message. Start with the crewmen on the dolphecikhen fleets then go to the youngest, and the first one of these mangy maggots who make a sound or try to escape will die." One brutal change of approach succeeded in the artful superior's turn of eyes, his icy glare menacing at the aghast villagers.

"Stop! We surrender, Mantus!" The drooping beard from the head of the village folded as he threw up his arms, not wanting any trouble. "But we don't know where she is, not the unfortunate woman...the Daughter of a Leader you seek!" He besought the temperate swordsman to understand, and called the fellow watchmen to tell the skeleton crew the locations of their jewelry.

"What about the ladys? I have two daughters!" The concerned father in the hole ached on the band of rambunctious troublemakers advancing to his door when Mantus dispatched orders to sabotage every square alley and pier.

"It's them, or our live." The chieftain wore a stone heart.

Lus-nayi scanned the scene from the window when she listened to a scream in the hall, her motionless stare swelled before she could crawl outside their house.

"Tell me you have room for one more. I'll have two smool-floras for the price of one." The door to a humble shack burst to the dirt bottom as the devastating horde crashed through. The shouts of invaders chased a lean ringleader's keen whistle, he curled his fingers around the vitreous sword-hilt. "We want your riches, not your lives. Don't get in our way and no one else will have to pay for it. That means you, soft wenches." Joiquiva quaked at an endangering swear from the home-blood, at the hand of a slash he slunk around the corner they were confined. With his sharp blade and the size of the thugs in his pack his menace could easily become her doom. Joiquiva huddled with Lus-nayi in shock, still like a stepping-rock they remained as the killer ordered his hooligans to ravage every shred of gold from the dignified foundation. Joiquiva and Lus-nayi embraced each other.

"Mother's ring, we'll never survive without it." Though Lus-nayi's brave spirit dreaded what may come of her from the pirates, the girl clothed in crimson embodied the essential maturity to know the taskmaster could not violate Qui-Qua Code of Tradition and slaughter another of his tribe...even if she did snoop. Joiquiva denied Lus-nayi's stealth abilities but this time she reluctantly cast her positive sister free to rummage in a threshed basket while she scampered away. Smiles bestowed Lus-nayi's burgundy lips when she clipped the ruby on to her nose and signaled to her sister's departing sleeve of amber.

"I told you not to get in my way, and what did you do? Now...what did your pitiful Father call you by when he was still alive, pest-girl?" Less than by what instant her rosy eyes could see passed before Lus-nayi was grasped by the scarlet collar and bullied by the gruff voice's forced removal of her ring. Only when that spiderred fist wrapped around her slender ankle, bucking from the sole did Lus-nayi realize the meaning of the lead swordmaster's warning. Normally, he did not dole it out. This merciless rascal was very unlike other Quiin-Draconik men she knew, unsympathetic to womanly errors in judgment.

Joiquiva hushed her terse whimpers to a deadened numb whilst she endured the desecrated maiden taken away and throttled in secrecy. "Now, if the other flora will show her face she may escape with her fear intact." The lithe master of the squadron stalked out to task after he had left Lus-nayi in the wash-basin petrified.

"Bloth wants us to report before sundown, we don't have time to make a game out of the other one, Sir. Dash out of here like always?" The scorpaonrat shrugged his quarter-limbed torso and swaggered to the stained window. Coral splotches of evening-tide in the half-lidded haze bathed the coastline.

"Oh well. Neither of them will live to see another sun...even if they even want to. We won't return empty-handed. Shipping out on these grub-ghetto's ships will make for a profitable conquest indeed. The glowing moons will rise full for navigating through the lost-backwashes tonight, like this Moon-princess when she put out her Light, Lord Bloth will be pleased." The exacting one rasped with a pungent chill that shadowed his pleasant composure, after which both of the tough-ranks burbled on their remorseless hunt back to the Maelstrom.

Joiquiva foraged for the room Lus-nayi lay, listening for her weeping groans. When she untied the ropes on her sister's elbows, she forked a match of surmounted feet around her waist and carried her kin on back to a detour beneath an escalating hysteria.

'Shuskav! Ayi makro yoira toivak!

Joiquiva evoked the commitment of safety to Lus-nayi's reddened cries. Her world had been exchanged for a downpour like a dreary joke, the pride of the family she had always looked up to was tender like an ailing child.

"Bloth has been here, alright. Who knows how long ago, but it's only a matter of time before he finds out where this Quest is going." Ren perused Ioz with his survey of the stolid beaches and roadways as he tread on perforated driftwood or jar shards with every wince, as had been snatched then pelted from proper places. "Let's head out, we're not going to find anything here." He paled with heartache at charred and busted remains of the lot of the besieged homes.

"Awful." Tula could only bestow one word to the damage done to a productive precipice of natural fields and sanctuaries. Some structures still stood and were livable, but deserted. The impoverished populace of the jungle suburbs had surely evacuated for elsewhere. Ioz waggled on the dagron tracks in the sand. The sun-clad lass sauntered into Ren's vision.

"We think they were looking for someone...a Noble's daughter from here who knew something about the jewels they are bent on finding. Though we heard many screams, we did not see what happened after our house was destroyed. I couldn't flee. Sister wanted me to leave her but I couldn't do such a thing, she is my beloved Shuskav...before myself. Lus-nayi says that you are not responsible for what the pirates plundered and she asks you who you are, I am Joiquiva." Joiquiva introduced herself. Like the honey in her gaze she sat with a gawk of dim cheekbones.

"I don't know how someone can do something so terrible to you but I assure you, our intentions are noble. I am Ren, Prince of Octopon. I'm on a Quest to save Merr from the Dark Water. We're in search of the Thirteen Treasures of Rule. I think I know who was behind your trouble. And I promise, I will never let anyone hurt you if you come with us...Especially not Bloth or his crew." Ren swore his humane oath to Joiquiva. Lus-nayi inspected the warmth emerging in the prince's sincere eyes, and she trusted him.

"Really? Do you think you can help tell us where the Guyfoo Capsule is?" Joiquiva brushed back her sooty tresses, baffled by the real exclusivity of their culture to foreigners. "You've never before heard of the Guyfoo Capsule? It's a legend from ancient Qui-Qua. If you can find the Guyfoo Capsule it will grant you the very thing you need once it has matured, but if you have a secret password...perhaps you can reap the reward faster. Ren, Lus-nayi and I would do just about anything to bring our parents back. Lus-nayi says if we can find it, she knows it will grant our father and mother life again! We just need some gold to buy it from anyone who has it captured, and we'll do any work neccessary to earn enough!" She heartily squealed with hope.

"Gantha-wash, land-floras. You don't bring someone back from the dead once they're gone." Ioz rejected any shy possibility of legend magic. The twins glared in instant resentment, they shouldered astray with icy despise whenever he spoke.

"Ioz, will you stop being so insensitive? Think of all they've gone through." Tula rowed with Ioz's hedonistic coldness, she tended to the ill sisters on the floor of the Wraith.

"We don't have this variety of minga-melon on our isle. Lus-nayi would like to try it because she is very hungry." Lus-nayi sat cross-legged by her vocal twin, who conferred on her behalf.

"What is a minga-melon of a different color to you?" Niddler was resistant as he selfishly hoarded the leafy rind and pawned it in the pink's stead, but Joiquiva's slovenly quietude won him over. Lus-nayi flavored the succulent treat with her jowls, and she was in love.

"For saying this bilge is impossible makes me always the bad guy, I am. I don't see anything wrong with wanting to make a little gold off this Quest, not sail from charity to charity." Ioz disdainfully ground his temper and lolled on the secure edging of the ship. "Quiin women are dumb as naja-tails, I wouldn't risk my neck...What kind of rudderless chunga-lunga goes back to find a wedding ring?" The impatient swashbuckler frivolously complained to his lonesome. Peeking on his lap to a ditty of gold, he relented. "Well, maybe that is understandable...but to bring your parents back from the dead? That never happens." He cynically examined the dwellings of his pocket, a badge inscribed Captain Raymit.

"I wonder if Say is from the same clan." Ren eased from his set to cast off, listening to the orphans playing an odd game of Roll-the-Minga-Melon between themselves and Niddler. Sometimes they would giggle or snuggle the monkeybird, of whom they were becoming acquainted well and fully trusted besides. Lus-nayi was naturally the stranger of the duo, preferring to hide her trembling figure under the frazzled scarlet robing and soiled hair. Her counterpart was equally garbed in a glossy yellow.

"I don't think I know anyone named Say from our villages, Tikla Ren of Octopon. Mm, I'm sorry." Joiquiva sadly knelt in a show of vulnerability. "Maybe it is a blessing word, Ay, Tula? Our names have blessings, I am Joy and Lus-nayi is Light of the Moon. It's ironic though, because I can't feel joy at all and Lus-nayi is afraid of the night." She shared a friendly bond between new acquaintances.

"You mean you can't feel joy at all, not even since the day you were born?" The Andorian charmer seemed doubtful, before now she hadn't heard of anyone completely unable to experience what she and other merrlings could.

"No, mother couldn't either. The Quiin Princes will reign and maidens will bow. The nature of Fairness is to make a Lord's happy home by joining together with many keepers. The men in our villages marry us to keep us safe from a painful death that will surely follow should we refuse to dance vibrntly and bring one to six baby among an Ookhaat every two years. Toishok's whisper, merciful ones." Joiquiva stood to bear Lus-nayi to the bridge and lodge inside the hovel, Tula hopped down the steps with Niddler but shyly listened in to another bout of rivalry.

"If you don't tell her at sun-up, I'm going to tell her to worry herself with a handsome sailor who can man up the more. You deserve her." Ioz snipped alone to Ren, positive the ecomantic-mage had gone.

"I love everything about Tula...but I'm not sure how long we will be on this Quest. I'm not going make a promise to her I'm not sure I can keep from breaking, if that's what she even wants. I don't know when I'll be able to restore Octopon in full, and then I'll have to assume the throne. Maybe we have been in more trouble but how does that make it any more right, what if her heart changes by then? You win this bet, it's not me you should be pressuring. I'll have no time for sailing on the Wraith when I'll be King of Octopon, except on diplomacy voyages...and it's not even ours to bet on anyway. You should ask her about it, I always thought you were really good with her, Ioz." The gentle prince whispered in the middle of a discomforted shuffle that Ioz always was able to work out of him, he leaned to the railing of the starboard as usual.

"That's why you forfeit your chips in a high-stakes gambling-match, before the dice have been thrown down. I mean it, lad. If you change your mind, you can always walk away. We've been on this Quest for how long, Ren, a year and we're still here talking about the jitatan woman. You're not going to tell me she is nothing more than a shipmate to you, you're the jitatan Prince of Octopon. If Tula decides this, we're back where we started six-fullmoons ago." Ioz walked out to the bowsprit while Ren took over his manning of the helm as big-talk dictated the eve, the gruff rambles and dirty tongue from the intense stud were lost in the setting of Merr's marvelous star.

Almond eyes of the forest saw everything was normal on the Wraith at evening time, when tensions and inclinations were most high. The nature-binder yawed from a secret watch of the men and sprung off. Tula and Niddler resumed their comfort after the recent intermission was put to bed. The buckled crew sailed all night.

The sun started to sink low on the horizon as the Wraith toddled a steady course to the land of Janda, it was not far Southwest from where it was formerly docked. Ren handled the riggings as a pink-clothed sorceress and a colorfully-infused avian strode out from the inside of the den. The young lady yawned. "It's been so long since I've been able to sleep in a bed that didn't smell like borca-paste." Tula gladdened with a cheery smile as she stretched her arms up.

The florid hybrid crinkled from the doorway, frisking his wings in the air and gingerly parading to the floor. "Ahh, so nice to have wings that work again." Niddler happily noted. He proudly settled to eye his surroundings, hands on his haunches. He then alit to the rail of the bridge, where Ioz stood. "I think I've slept up an appetite. Hey, where are all the melons that I didn't eat yesterday?" He sheepishly searched around, expecting to find some of the food that had been left there the night earlier.

"Scoot, monkeybird, or I'll throw you overboard!" Ioz shooed the hungry and pestering avian-friend, who protested with a squawk and flew back to Tula.

"Ioz, did you go to sleep at all? It sounds like you could use some." Tula addressed the dark-haired navigator with annoyance.

"What I could use is a good Janda-town hot-streak!" The thrill-seeker yielded jaunty feedback as he grinned and steered onward.

"Hmph! I think I liked it better when it was just me and Ren! At least he cares about something besides getting soaked like a sea-hog at taverns!" Niddler snappily scoffed. He nuzzled the ecomancer beside him. "Of course I missed you Tula." He simpered shyly as the sensitive woman laughed and pet his head. To this Ioz only replied with a huff. "And orphans who can make deck-scraps delicious!" He warmly lapped his chops at a small but decadent plate of minced goija. Lus-nayi politely gathered her dress to kneel. The Quin sisters managed to perfect an uncommon method of cooking without fire and often produced elegant meals out of drippings that not even naja-dogs would dry heave from their sour stomachs, delicious food consisting of air.

"We'll be there soon, Niddler." Tula consoled the scuffled monkeybird.

"Hah! At least now we have a cook. Even orphans know how to be useful, unlike this woman." Ioz furrowed his brow, enjoying a hearty chuckle. The orphans both scowled.

"It's not my problem you don't like my cooking, Ioz." Tula squelched her irritation and marched off. "We're very proud of you, Lus-nayi." She hugged the docile but proud chef, encouraging the slim girl to smile gracefully.

The maiden clothed in a spring sunstraw approached her red-eyed sibling and professed the valueable Treasure would be safer in their own arms than in harm's way. Ren didn't feel all confident, but he would be better able to assure their safety if they went along with him.

"Can we go to Qui-Qua? To eat?" Niddler pothered as he slurped a liquefied melon rind. It tasted better than one he spit out because it was tart.

"No." Ioz blurted his negative objection before the avian could finish.

"Why not?" Niddler fussed as he indulged in wharf-fare.

"It's too far North from here." The helm-bound sailor decided correctly. "I guess they're not so bad." He did admit the image of Joiquiva and Lus-nayi cuddling was a fine sample of the much-needed serenity on an ocean of insecurities. During that time the orphans laid in Ioz's viewpoint they slept too soundly to glower at him.

Ren viewed the district they were now pulling into, the bordering waterways were guarded by two towering pillars of stone. It was quite a sight to behold, whether you were on a ship or watching one haul in. He had not slept for a long time. He hoped a good evening in town might do him some good as well, or at least get his mind off his unrest. Naturally, he would leave all the gambling to Ioz. "Port is straight ahead!" Ren yelled out, Ioz led into the harbor. The three sailors and a monkeybird disembarked and hoofed their road to Zoolie's Gamehouse. There they were immediately greeted by the hearty tavernowner with the beard of fire.

"So good to see ye all again! What's with the dungeon equipment?" The tavernmaster questioned with a peaking curiosity as he beamed at the round and cumbersome Treasure.

"That...is our latest trophy!" With a keen smile in stride Ioz displayed the token, whispering into Zoolie's ear while patting the shiny jadestone of onus in Ren's arms.

"Wait..." The orange-haired proprietor leaned over to fetch a better glance. "This raffendia thing, you mean to tell me that it's a Treas-" Zoolie was about to finish as he lifted a soliciting eyebrow, hampering the right guess.

Ren shifted magnified eyes to Ioz and mouthed a phrase, Don't Say It. "Not so loud! Please! And yes, it is." Ren shouted through a silent tongue. He transposed his eyes toward the tavernkeeper, conveying seriousness in shrinking pupils.

"Aye. Alright, well I suppose I can allow it in then. S'long as you don't use it as a weapon! Extra company, with ye? I'll put these two to work! Waitress, show our hungry guests some pay and some grub on us." The atmosphere furled with a whistle for waitstaff to help the orphans. "Welcome to the Party!" The smolder-maned giant gestured a gallant smile and a chuckle. He dealt Ioz a friendly slap on the back as the man moseyed inside, to which the prince simply shone a modest grin back. They left their weapons at the door, Ioz helped Ren's dagger off of the belt.

"We're going to have to find a better way to hide that thing or at least come up with a better story for it. It's a good thing we left Bloth with the jitatan spinners in the cave." Ioz sneakily hushed to Ren from the hall to the pub.

"If you have any suggestions, let me know." Ren murmured in return, making sure to keep his volume humble.

PART 2 - Upwind to the Shrouded Scale

The adventures sat down under a low-hanging window at the humdrum trimming of the tavern. Ioz was on his second or third drink by now, no one could tell. The wily bandit had actually won a bit of coin. Whether he would hang on to it, remained undetermined. Ren and Tula stayed by Niddler and Zoolie, who joined them at their table to take a break from the excitement. "So what brings my three favorite travelers here on this plenteous occasion of the two good moons?" Zoolie prompted with friendliness, speaking to the three in a joyful hospitality.

"We've been through a lot seeking our...trophy, and it was suggested we come here to rest." Ren imparted with humbleness, temporarily turning at the drabul-hungry swashbuckler from across the bar.

"Ah. I was worried about you guys, you know about the Great Wave right? Actually made me leave this jitatan place, couldn't pass up a rare occasion to see such an event." Zoolie propounded words of hearsay, chuckling soberly. "I heard it could be seen all over from this side of Merr. Scary, if you think about it." Zoolie compelled a flimsy laugh, motioning back to the calamity. Even in Janda-town, the Great Wave had filled the skies where many could see it. Although it did not last long and no one close had been able to place where it originated, it thrust most of the Western hemisphere of Merr into a standstill. He scoured at the three who did not respond, but he knew they understood. "I hear the dark water is starting to appear frequently too, more so than before. Just the other day I had a swab in here who saw a ship full of it, 'bout five points North of here he said." The tavernowner sauntered on, now constraining a troubling air of something none of the immediate had known about.

"Really?" Ren's eyes lit up in regard, he worried. If those accounts were true, everything right he was doing for Merr was absolutely backlashing. Somehow. He privately wandered back to when they departed from Arakna and he remembered what Avagon had previously said about the dark water, the only thing able to hurt him now. He steadied his nerve.

"We were caught in the Great Wave, but it didn't do any harm to the four of us." Tula conjoined in dilatory time. She did not elaborate about being captured by the Maelstrom and waking up torn apart from each other.

Zoolie's scrutiny showed skepticism. "Are ya serious? By Daven's beard, I don't believe it! That jitatan seastorm was gigantic! If that wasn't enough, it caused a downpour in Janda-town for two weeks, flooded the main streets and 'me goers were stuck here! I wouldn't have thought it were real if I didn't see it with my own seafaring eyes, nothing could have survived tha-" Zoolie slammed his mug on the table with surprise, he would have to stop himself from raising his timbre too loud. He did not believe what his friends were telling him, but he knew them to not lie. He was about to pry and try to get the truth out but something impinged his sense, telling him that he shouldn't. He carted on a happy lounge, letting his inquisitiveness go. "I hope you're steering clear of Bloth. Crazy jitatan sea-leech is on a rampage. I feel sorry for the poor people of Kalinda, it's gonna take em' months to get back on their feet." Zoolie for once pessimistically droned as he washed down a sip of his ale and perused his sea-heavy friends, who appeared as if there was too much they were inhibited by.

"And Bloth is also responsible for the raid on Lus-nayi's village because he was looking for someone's daughter...I wonder who." Tula studied the orphans' saga, she unknowingly surveyed the chatting customers.

"What about the dark water, Zoolie?" Ren tried for a rehash of the tale, even though he most likely would be fearful of the news. He wanted to know more about this.

"The dark water, laddie? Well, aside from what I told ye, I've been hearing a lot of word from gamehouse goers that it's startin' in places it didn't before. I can't say where exactly, but I would be careful if you're intending on sailing out to wherever you're headed." Zoolie included a tip to the orphans as he took another swig of his ale and focused concerned eyes on the flaxen-sparked prince, who barely touched his.

"I see. Thanks Zoolie. We'll need to be mindful of our next course." Ren graciously expressed. He spent a polite smile at the man, who returned a look that could have only been read that he should not even mention it. "We're probably going to head up North from here. We still need to visit back home, too." He cloaked the Treasure tightly in his arms, suddenly wondering whether Jenna would be alright. "That will be our next stop." He extruded a mottled intensity, then pulling himself together. He strengthened his resolve, priming to find courage for the voyage ahead.

"Excuse me, I hate to interrupt, but do you happen to have any food I can eat? I'm really quite hungry..." Niddler ruffled at last, hunger overtaking him. He had not genuinely eaten since before they left Arakna.

"Oh! How could I forget! Done!" Zoolie exclaimed as he snapped with his thumb, gesturing humorously. He spun to slant inward at the bar. "I'll have a round of our finest for our out-of-town visitors! On the house, as always!" Zoolie signaled to the waitstaff on duty, returning a pleasant composition. Food arrived quickly and the trio of hungry shipmates started chowing down.

"What is this, shardfish? I go off to play a game or two and you're already having a sailor's feast without me? Ay borga!" Ioz ultimately swaggered over to the table, goosing Zoolie a chummy elbowjab.

"Sit you down, Ioz, you barnacle-rat! I ordered a plate for you too." The warm tavernowner welcomed him to the table, literally pulling the ale-heavy wagerer into the seat next to him. Ioz took a swig of his grog in hand and started tearing into his plate, joining his friends.

"So did you get bored of the competition, Ioz?" Tula derivatively instigated.

"No. I spent all my gold." The ink-crested pirate said plainly, taking another sip of his ale. Tula edged a smug smirk. Ioz continued to scarf down a scrumptious spread of meat and dough rolls, he reposed in his chair at an arriving stock of an exquisite gourd. "That's kleepa!" He pronounced with a longing peer as the airy waitress laid the spiny juice-plant on the slab.

"Only the best, me mates!" Zoolie cheered of rapport. With the twist of his whiskers, he cleaved up a knife in preparation to cut a notch in the kleepa root. The flighty blond to the standing of the manager organized five cups over the board as Lus-nayi and Joiquiva set the table.

"Now this really is a celebration!" Ioz bellowed with an anticipating pitch. The thorny root was sliced and the nectar within trickled into every dish. The quintette appropriately aspired their glasses.

"A toast to friends! Drink till your bellies are full!" Zoolie erupted with a billowing laugh, clacking his drink to the opposite chalices. He gulped his treat and dotted eyes at Ioz's gaze, which had mingled with the humming maiden who was clearing the messy hull. "Aye, she's available Ioz." Zoolie tossed his manfriend a blunt hint. The peppy girl giggled.

"Ugh, to think what he would do if he wasn't with us." Tula allot a disgusted gander, briskly darting her concealed pupils at the wall with a scoff. She sighed as she enabled a stare over at Ren as he seemed to be gawking quite indifferently at her, but not the helpmate.

"'Er name's Luucee the tavern wench, or so the regulars call her." Zoolie whispered a cue. "Best server I've ever known. Really is surprising she 'hasn't taken the ceremony, if ya know what I'm gettin' at." He shied away, leaving Ioz to flirting. The bouncy figure pointed a wink to the influenced hero before prancing off.

"Aye, you pudgy denbar-rat! You have an eye of the sun, Zoolie, but you remind me of how much I love it here. What happens in Janda-town is Misplaced in Janda-town! I'll bet...I'd take you up on that offer mate, but this Quest doesn't allow for much down-time. I have other winds to watch for." Ioz chuckled after raising his spirit to a gleam and another tip of brew.

"I thought that was, What Happens In Janda-town Gets Eaten In Janda-town!" Niddler gaped straight ahead from his slouch, shakily replacing the beverage on the table with a belch.

"Janda-town is a pirate's playground! Down the hatch!" Ioz elatedly floated away with the hoist of his cup. Tula bore ice in the corner, feeling quite estranged.

The five friends chatted for a length of time about foolishness or what came to mind, Ioz had been informed of the situation and things remained quiet as they conversed into the evening. drew late into moonrise as different crowds appeared throughout the night.

"Whenever you guys plan to head out just let me know, and if you need anything or an extra hand to bare, don't hesitate to ask." Zoolie felicitously beamed, unmistakably honest. They knew he had bailed them out before and he would not think twice to again.

"Thanks, Zoolie. We will." Ren articulated gratefully, humbly finishing up what he strove to eat of of his meal. He glimpsed at Tula who had nearly completed hers and Niddler, who accomplished an ending long ago and was evidently hungering still.

"Are there any more of those fruity goija-sticks left? That squid-getti was heavenly." The monkeybird shyly requested, he licked his chops and peeked up hopefully at the tavernowner with green and welcoming monkeybird-eyes.

"Friad not, my friend." The gamehouse-owner glanced at him sympathetically, showing him a quick but disappointing reply.

"Awww." Saddened, Niddler whimpered and veered down.

"Try this, monkeybird." Ioz partially whispered to Niddler, passing a glass of kleepa-ale to which the avian raised an eyebrow at, and downed half. Niddler then fell off his chair with a squawk, Ren looked at him.

"I think we should be heading out, Zoolie. Thank you much for the-" Ren had been about to stand and say his departure when he witnessed something going on within the tavern. Zoolie saw it too and speedily got up.

"Noy borga! Give me back my gold, you kreld-eating...cheater!" Screaming detestation accelerated from a patron. Expansive braids crimped about the frame of her face swung when she flipped off of a table. She ducked down after gritting with an aggressive furor and picked up the seat that she was about to chuck at a barechested brute across from her.

"Fair's fair, wench! You played and I won!" The angry gorger growled. He almost flipped the table over on her which with quick reflexes, the vitriolic denizen made to dodge.

"Hey, hey! Hey! Whoa!" Zoolie waded over through stomping boots, standing between them both. "If you've got a tussle, take it outside, both of you. This is my Gamehouse, and I won't let you ruin it with your rough-and-tumble-sultry-spirited affairs!" He relented his spiel, marking at the dual rogues with a gaze to intimidate. The rough lass was giving him trouble and tried to break back through the bar so he lifted her up by a clinging collar, to which she fought him to let go. The estranged chump quickly grabbed his weapon from a scabbard in the storeroom and trounced off through the front door. Zoolie set the scrawny woman on the ground, persisting in the grasp of her neckband. "And as for you, Miss, as much as I like nice lady's as company, fighting will get ye a ticket to the door!" He sighed from disappointment as he ushered her to the exit, all the while she rallied in frenzy.

"Wait! You have no idea who I am! I'm the Daughter of Someone heroically Important!" The rowdy dame furiously shouted as she was about to be ejected from the medley-inn.

"So is my auntie Soosoo, but if she fights in 'me Gamehouse, she'll be kicked out too!" The disturbed pub-master admonished, at last pushing her out the doorway despite her boisterous protests. "Aye, wharf-rats, will say anything to pull one over on yhe'." Zoolie relieved a sweaty brow as he concluded his eviction of the troublemaker and swayed to return to the table.

"Wait, Zoolie, what did she say? Something's not right." Ren arose from his chair and raced toward the door. He bustled into the weapons' closet, retrieving his curt blade and exited out the front before anyone could stop him.

"Chungo-lungo, where in the twenty seas does he think he's going? You stay here, monkeybird!" Ioz gunned for the trek as he jumped up from the bench to follow the youthful lad. Tula and Zoolie tailed thereafter.

"What about the Treas-" Niddler snatched onto the emerald orb with his velvet palms, shielding with wings as he rent himself mid-sentence. "Ure?" He pursed as he watched his friends bound through the unlatched door.

The darkened streets of Janda-town were visually empty. Many pedestrians stayed in homes or in barrooms, wide streets opened up to form many byways among the seaside villa. Only the lights of distant inns or taverns, and natural moonlight blanketed the scene.

The stable prince dashed after the strange one's form in the twin moon-lit night. "Stop! Wait!" With a wheeze, Ren labored to reach the fleeing goal. Her taut figure rushed and then halted, meeting him around.

"That kreld-eater kicked me out because that filthy pirate stole from me! No one believes me! If only they did, I wouldn't be in so much trouble! Rumors are one thing, but Janda-towns' folks are verily presumptuous in mortality calls!" The ly's prohibited vocal dissented to Ren, his shadow easing above hers.

"Believe you? Believe you about what?" The anxious Ren invoked of her. Her features were hidden in the dark, though they were inconsistently illuminated by a glossy zenith.

"I'm a Daughter of a Reputable King, and everyone says I'm lying! No one believes I am who I say I am!" The bitter challenger despondently proclaimed.

"What great King? Who are you?" Ren eyed her with an expression of one concocting puzzlement. His mind made a total backflip when he received her answer. He could only ask her to repeat herself, he did not think he heard her correctly. Locks of sepia graced her visage as she spun about. Dual irises of peacock brightly pried.

"Princess Jazhea, of Octopon. Daughter of King Primus." The woman's voice spoke softly.


	5. The Dagron's Tail

THE DAGRON'S TAIL

PART 1 - The River's Deceit

Moonlight shone over the shores of Janda, on the patio of a lessened but bustling tavern stayed three men and one woman. All engrossed in fervent conversation.

"I swear on the two moons, that's the first time I've ever seen that lady, Ren!" The coral-bearded barman went on in an obvious confoundment and ignorance of the situation. "Had I known I wouldn't have kicked her out, but do you believe her? If she's been to any tavern in Janda-town then she hasn't been to mine, I never forget a face." He confirmed as he peered through the window, as did the rest of the group.

"I can see a resemblance." Ioz accordingly blurted out. He diverted to and fro the waif and Ren, comparing them. "Is she really Ren's sister?" Ioz uncertainly debated, keeping his fronting concealed from the table across from him.

"By Kuunda, I don't know what to believe. That familiar garment..." The adolescent soundly formulated as he prospected the barefooted femme from where she sat, watching her feast on a complimentary meal. Formidable features on the stranger were scratched from strife and without brawn. Rather, she was entirely vulnerable in a warrior's dress of peacock hue. The white-trimmed ruffle around the knees modestly curved on her stocky legs. She waggled her head to admire them and smiled sweetly, swinishly tearing off a bite from her plate. "Even if she isn't, she's from Octopon." He faintly murmured and switched his gaze to Ioz.

"So we're basing opinions of her on her clothes? I think I've seen less mess and scars on some clam-barges." Ioz tentatively allot his impression of Ren's eavesdropping technique. In that instant, she began feeling around the table.

"No. I've never seen her before from what I can remember, but she knows things about me that only a few people in the twenty seas could tell. Bloth doesn't know the exact location I was raised for seventeen years, or substantial details about our culture. She chants the same lore and legends from Jenna's overtures of my childhood, and I just know I've seen that ensemble before." Ren adeptly asserted his hunch, eyes following a gust of wind blowing a trifle of palm-leaves on the crazy roads beneath his bench.

"Well she sure seems to be hungry. She eats like she hasn't seen a square meal in ages. She's probably in trouble, Ioz. Don't you think someone of her stature would have a surplus of income to fall back on? Unless she squandered it...Not to mention, any long-term moonlighter from Janda-town I've seen could not hide in a monkeybird-berth and still have room for Niddler. So how is she on her own? Something is...different." Tula observed obscurely-leeward the company of chirping crickets, peeking at the distant guest from astern a beam in the tavern. The vagabond was now faking several men in the establishment with gestures of reluctance. The man at the bar, Maars, watched the cantankerous newcomer like a razorbeak.

"What do you think, Tula?" The jet-tinged fortune-hunter respectfully invited an opinion.

"I'm sensing sorrow from her. Pain, and sadness." The ecomancer sincerely commented, scoping the poring-parlor as the unfamiliar woman turned back to eating without a care.

"Did Ren say no one believed her? Bloth is searching for him, right? So wouldn't someone've questioned her claim?" Zoolie thoughtfully whispered as he accompanied the discussion. "Oh Ioz, I have that fifty drabul you need, but you better pay me back next time you're here, you hear me? No jitatan flood-checks." With a serious intrude he glowered at the frivolous companion at his angle, a bag of coins clinked. Ioz rigidly nodded.

"I thank you much, man, for the loan of gold and this coat of many colors as a souvenir." The haughty pirate admired the fancy and expensive raiment of Zoolie's.

"You can have it, Ioz. I just want to get rid of it. Sell it all you want, but I wouldn't put it on." The buoyant manager heartily advised.

"Ioz and Niddler look a-like!" Tula marveled at the twins made by rainbow stripes on the antique garb.

"You look sharp, mate, but as your best chum, I warn ya...it's cursed." Zoolie tipped Ioz with his concern but the gold-seeker fortune-hunter shrugged and batted a hand, his closest ale-mate never did know how to take heed.

"I'll sell it when I get to Octopon, I want to look nice now. Attracts the ladys, eh?" Ioz grinned wide with a sprightly whim. He wrapped the fold around his shoulders and tied the front sash about his waist.

They were interrupted by a monkeybird, who waddled up while holding an orb that appeared almost as immense as his haunch and tail. "Are you all done bar-watching now or are you going to relieve me of this?" Niddler indignantly bossed, plopping the copious mineral on the sky-lined deck.

Ioz ignored the mess of feathers who squawked to catch attention from anyone. "That may be true but Mer's men know who Ren is now, I wouldn't doubt she could be coming across as trying to swindle coin out of his name. If I were anyone, I wouldn't believe it for a pretty kreuger." Ioz wisely added, forming speculation on the alehouse-mans's theory. "She's unharmed, any seafaring man or other knows Janda-town's streets are no place for a lost traveler to walk alone." He posed a revision to his prior resolve, an acute qualm simmered under his logic.

"That is a good point." Ren reasonably construed in his response to Ioz, the unlikely citizen was otherwise unsullied. Niddler impatiently squawked.

"I'll go over and have a little chat with her, and keep that gold where I can see it." Ioz initiated discreetly and edged away from the moonlit bench. "Give it here, monkeybird." He regained the Treasure as the venturing four lumbered over to the table where the jade-clad vixen lounged.

When the bevy returned, the silk-wrapped rascal was chatting up some man in the bar who had become interested in her. He offered to play a bet with her, which she affirmed she would accept when she happened upon some gold. He tried to make a counter-proposal, but uncomfortably backed away when he witnessed the group plodding en route to her. She caused a disarranged brow from the crew when the frightened heckler tossed her a full sachet of gold at the flip of her tunic's shoulder.

"Hello, Jazhea. That's your name, is it?" Ioz procured a welcome with a leery inflection, sitting down opposite from the spotty woman. His squint shaped on a simple embellishment about her high neckline.

"Yes, pirate, it is." Jazhea concurred with a vibrant smile, to the contrast of her tough actions.

"Nice to meet you, Jazhea. I'm Tula." Tula generously but hesitantly extended her hand. Jazhea grinned and tipped her unfamiliar tricorne, which also accommodated what seemed to be a Ferrix-feather.

"Let me take over, Ioz." With candor Ren swiftly exhorted on with his interview, he accepted his cue and rested on the seat across from the drifter at his shoulderline. "You didn't answer before, what brought you to Janda-town." The charming regent intently sought from the counter nook.

"As I've said before, to seek fortune. Well I suppose, what I would wish for is revenge on those maggots who ruined our home. If it were only possible to find fair retribution for-" Jazhea gallantly began, but her language was immediately aborted.

"Bloth's destruction of Octopon. When did you arrive here?" Ren narrowed his eyes at the stranger who claimed to be his sister and fellow heir.

"Whoa, did my Ol' seafaring ears hear what I think they heard? Did you just say you're trying to get revenge on Bloth? Now you've only had one drink little bitty-lady so I know you aren't spilling gantha-wash. Don't mind me saying this, but you're a tad delusional, miss. Bloth is Lord of the baddest scum of the twenty seas and you don't tangle with any of those men! The Maelstrom is home to the lowest bunch to ever raise the jolly-roger! Don't let me hear this kind of jabber in my tavern again or-" Zoolie earnestly barged in, standing from his locate. Few glances flew, the newcomer scowled coldly in return.

"Zoolie, we don't crew for the keel-scraping man anymore. That is a very brash proclamation, Jazhea, but I'm sure someone respectable as the Princess of Octopon would not be folly enough to slit her honorable throat, especially when The Least of his pirates is as tall as she is." Ioz surprisingly twisted around, expressing a disapproving nod at the barkeeper.

"I know! I have nothing to lose though, please listen! I only will for an ear to hear me." Jazhea additionally begged from a tender face.

"Here we go...go on." Ioz entertained the woman of time further, who politely palmed her sign for a chance opportunity. He swigged another sip of his grog. "Let's give her a chance to explain herself." He gulped the foam of a warm brew. He wearily deduced her statement.

"I wasn't ever aware I was sibling to anyone around Janda-town. When I left Meridol, four years ago, I was the only child of the Royal Family. It's a dreadful tragedy to hear that our father has passed, considering the conditions of such a specific jurisdiction he left for his best heir." Jazhea sat and clarified, nonchalantly pausing to finish the last bites of her meal. She savored a taste of the ale and an unladylike grimace then resumed over her scant cheeks, by all means made unnoticeable between heavy locks of gossamer.

"Your neck..." Zoolie let out a worrisome mumble and resumed his perch.

"I've only been here for two weeks. It has been difficult traveling alone, and I'm unable to stay anywhere. My journey was long and slow, so I often did not meet many. I tried to tell them my needs, but I suppose my claim is hard to be taken seriously. Kuunda has brought me here since, so I've been trying to make the best of it and so far, I've only managed to make meager coin. It was the separation from my partner on the seas that ended me in this impeccable circumstance. We were forced to go from place to place, weathering the waves and storms. Of course I would probably have more help if I were the Prince of Octopon, but unfortunately, I'm only the Princess." The abrupt interloper defined, her voice was soft and sensitive.

Ren tossed this around for a moment. He wanted to know more, he scratched his chin. "You're here on your own? You must know the seas are invaded by the dark water. Our crew is in need of funds ourselves but-" Ren mouthed a mid-sentence word when Jazhea pushed the recently obtained funds to Ren. The boy only blinked for an instant before Ioz's swear of Pango-Neeja ricocheted and the lass courteously glimmered.

"In that case, please take this. It was my payment for a favor I offered but it's the least I can do, I imagine a future King such as yourself will need it more than any tattered wharf-rat like me." Jazhea gracefully maintained herself from a submissive standpoint as Lus-nayi and Joiquiva bused their last table for the night.

"Why? I'm sorry but I can't accept this, you just told me you needed it more-" Ren protested from a bite of his tongue. Jazhea would not reclaim the heap.

"Don't be silly. Men deserve the best treatment, especially Princes and Kings. It's only fifty pieces of course, but it will be of some help to you. I must thank you for your generosity of a good word." The sinewy beggar gleaned a pleasing virtue. The shy aristocrat apologetically accepted, but he did not pay heed to Ioz's pernicious inspection of her necklace.

"Thank you, but it's really Zoolie you should be thanking for your meal. I know you've set out but, why didn't you try to go back home earlier?" The overt prince questioned her, foraging for reason to trust her tale.

"I've been looking for who I was told to find, Vaecusa, a late-aunt to you and I. I was sent to sea by late Sir Phorlock, to find out what happened to her. I lived with her for a time, but on one mysterious sun she disappeared." After a hesitant blink, Jazhea calmly abstained from being a nuisance.

"How interesting. I used to live near Vaecusa! Phorlock, I don't think..." Ren tried to prospect the name.

"Regrettably, but vague hearsay I know naught. He was in...Dealings with Octopon, during Primus's time, says Sir Phorlock, Chair of the Defenders of the Polar Axis. Such an organization once existed on the Isles of Qui-Qua, consisting of a Father-and-Daughter team among its high-ranking legion of tribesmen." Jazhea spurned the local rumor, taking her own trial to a new level.

"Organization?" Ren drew a blank. Jazhea mentioned Sir Phorlock was a deity among his people, but Qui-Qua was not a place he had read about.

"He visited Octopon in the company of his consort, Vaecusa, before preventing the Polar uprising on the merchanting nation of Kalinda, where I lived the fruit of my years under his guardianship." Jazhea delicately unfolded after a swaying of flickering eyes. The confused spectators rolled shoulders, staring unwillingly.

"So, you know more than these rumors you've been told?" Tula hinted at something more, unconsciously lowering her perspective of the opposite lass.

"Oh, yes. However, perhaps we should keep such conversations light. You know, weird things tend to happen since the tragedy of the Moonsail Festival. The loss of Sir Phorlock was not something of any consequence to me, of course. My life was just fine, even after Vaecusa was forced to defect proportionately high North of our ravaged city, Octopon, for elsewhere in its Meridol district. I have not seen such memories with my own eyes, but I think it's very much a mood-killer to-" From the wandering patron could be heard a peculiar sound, but was immediately covered by lips. After the grating noise, she seemed to keep an air of grace.

"What tragedy?" This phrase lit Ren's purport, he would need to know everything about the incidence on Octopon's shores. He couldn't leave it alone, but Jazhea stubbornly sighed.

"Well, I've merely been informed to fill in the blanks, and because I was young at the time before I begun my search, my mind blocks out more of the distressing details." Jazhea did not wish to continue.

"Please." If Jazhea was Daughter of the House of Primus, Ren needed an end.

"The Palace of Scholars, a place declared a safehouse five-years prior harbored our relatives during the Day of Fire. It was the day before the Five-Hundredth Moonsail Festival, twelve years ago. It was planned to hold the festivities in the Great Harbor of Octopon, and it was ruined by Bloth's invasion. Only under the guidance of Sir Phorlock, Vaecusa, her youngest child, and I endured as the firebombs passed, we painfully lost the remaining nobility to survive. Unfortunately finding home is a leviathan's toss when knowing but of a gantha-wash street, gathering enough wealth to be a degree of help to protect and restore my Meridol residence of present-day is rather hard when you're only a bar-stool with a tale of the Kalindasean Nomads." The manner of the homeless lass was stark, altered by her feeling of repeated recognition.

"If you're looking for Meridol then now you're lost, it's far above where Octopon lays." Ren sincerely consoled the woman who was misplaced.

"If she's looking for Kalinda, she's out of luck also. That isle lays on the other side of Mer." Ioz scoffed to Ren, but was quickly shushed by his brashness.

"Technically East from Janda-town, if you sail off the map. I might be a monkeybird, but Mer isn't flat." Niddler pointed to his noggin, enjoying Ioz's growl.

Tula cleared her throat.

"Who was your partner on the sea? Aunt, did she tell you about my Father's Quest after you returned to Meridol or before Sir Phorlock brought you to the Moonsail Festival in Octopon? I didn't think anyone but my father's Captains were told about the Treasures of Rule, even you when living on Kalinda with this man my Father knew. The last time we debarked, the dark water had invaded the Palace of Scholars and the majority of Octopon's ports..." Ren earnestly brood. He hadn't heard any of his siblings mentioned, other than when Bloth said he eliminated them but he assumed such a terrible thing had taken place before he was born.

"Is that enough detail for you, Brother?" Jazhea settled the recount of her story. She now appeared perceptibly more disturbed, although her tone still carried an agreeable gentleness.

"Octopon has been partially restored, but I can't say much for where you live-" In one of Ren's encounters, he had come across a picture of his mother. The way this new guest conveyed the tragedy brought upon conclusions of happenstance for himself.

"That's a telling story, but I don't think we buy it. I need to pull you away for a moment, Ren." The shady-haired thief, Ioz, stood up and gestured for the maiden to leave, not a believer.

"Wait. There's some truth to what she's saying, how much I don't know." Ren also arose, venturesomely professing to the tall man at his margin. Living in Jenna's lighthouse had meant he did not know of his full heritage due to being the sole heir to the throne. His father was imprisoned by Bloth during the original Quest for the Treasures of Rule, his home in Octopon destroyed completely with Ren as the singular devotee responsible to save it. Still, something felt wrong in this situation and he could not be sure. He held back as if to consider something. "Even if she isn't my sister, then she's someone from home. I can be sure as the ebb of the Octopian Sea. If she comes with us, she may be able to assist us. We're headed back to Octopon on the way, we can take her there." The young aristocrat rotated to face Jazhea.

Ioz seemed floored then pushed away against the edge of table. With swelling eyes he got up and pulled Ren aside, shouting below the common noise level to him. "Ohno, Ren are you mad? We've only known her for less than a moonrise! I'd like to know why we hadn't run into such a lowly shardfish-of-a-woman before. If she knows so much why didn't she know of her brother being around when she was traveling all around the jitatan twenty seas, and much more the loss of her father? Her fee-for-a-favor trick was obvious. Sorry to tell you this, Captain, but this plan to stop for everyone who needs or asks for help is going to toss us into a jitatan monsoon." He sorely displayed his muted forewarning.

"She's survived on her own before, what if she knows something about the dark water or the Treasures from being on her venture? If I've learned anything from my Father's Quest, first impressions aren't always right." The noble boy incessantly countered, recalling Alomar's lesson. He stalwartly defended what he believed to be his audience's honesty.

"Yes, they are not always right but they are not always bilge-filth! I guarantee you she knows nothing! I may have been doubtful before but, noy jitat! Sure, let us help her go back home while she tricks us out of our gold! Are you sure she is from Octopon like you think...I've once heard a tale about a-" Ioz continually argued but was unexpectedly roused by the new helper pushing her way into Ren's sight, she had risen from her seat.

"We all know you're worried about your gold, Ioz, but I'm sensing an ecomantic-signal from her that I've never before felt." Tula hushed her status away.

"Excuse me, ahem, Ren. I think I would like to renege on our deal, if that's fine with you. I was thinking maybe...if you play a card game with me, and I win I'll take that gold back. I don't want you to regret my unconditional kindness, especially because Bloth has a hit on me for three-hundred-thousand drabul." Jazhea radiated with a buoyant gladness, she breaked to withdraw a standard deck from her margin.

"Chungo, you can't be serious." Ioz halfway suppressed a gasp.

"She's the unfortunate Daughter sought by Bloth..." Tula complacently shushed the swashbuckler.

"It's a deal!" Ren jovially approved of the idea. This way he would be giving Jazhea the fair chance she deserved, and he was more than positive she would win and Ioz wouldn't be so hasty to jump to conclusions. What was the worst that could happen?

"You guys are playin' again? Thought you were heading out." Zoolie swerved around with a blank raise of his cheerful brow, he would be unaffected by Ren's decision to stay but he was aware Ren didn't spend time with many social things.

"Just one game, Zoolie." The eager royal revolved with a contiguous humor. Zoolie moreover shrugged and resumed his workload.

"Treasure is treasure, I might as well get in on this." Ioz huffed and reoccupied the table, dealing himself thirteen cards.

"Well I guess this will be a chance to know each other better." Tula was reserved as she joined in, sliding in by Ioz.

"Z.M.Q.!" Suddenly a shriek from a rioter choked the ambiance.

"What?! Z.M.Q. is here?! Impossible! Z.M.Q. would never allow himself to be seen in a public tavern!" Ioz instantly hopped from his stool to peruse the clattered denizens, all focusing on Jazhea with blown-up pupils. Some were dashing for the armament cellar, and he would have done the same, should he need to be ready for the biggest fight of his life.

"Uhmm! Your turn!" Jazhea placed her first card with a blithe shout.

"You can't possibly be...Z.M.Q has a hit on you as well, Jazhea?!" Ioz gawked for a sour spell when she hurriedly concealed her right shoulder before lowering himself back to the seat, seeing nothing alarming.

"Don't touch Z.M.Q.'s property, his feared letters will sign your resignation to the bone!" One belated scream was flung. Jazhea coughed as a tear trickled off a lash.

"Who is Z.M.Q.?" From shaken nerves Tula questioned.

"A pirate. Words become screams and screams become letters when he is around. Janda-town greeting! Don't you know, woman?! Cut the kleepa, old mates!" Ioz grumbled to squelch a belated cough. Tula shifted worried eyes. "Well, Jazhea, good luck beating that." With a competitive smirk, Ioz laid down a card that she learned was fronted with a fish, a large yuugla. Jazhea instantly placed a dagron.

"This is the first time we've played together since we were here many moons ago. So, Jazhea, what was your favorite game? I was personally fond of playing pearl-skipper in the river of Randor. Father tried to teach me how to skip real stones, but I wasn't so good." Tula fluently engaged her elusive company. "I think someone's trying to bring down a moon already. No cheating for Ioz, Niddler." She poked the monkeybird, covering her hand.

"Sorry." Niddler squawked and hurried from his perspective behind Tula's shoulders.

"Umm, well, I didn't play too many games." Jazhea darted her rapidly-fluttering eyes to and fro, tensely answering her directive. "I always liked making Landshark Eyes from the tree's silk in the courtyard where we lived...so beautiful with its many inland rivers!" She gulped to urge the reply out of her throat. Tula stared at her and nodded at her fidget. Ioz established a leviathan suit next to Tula's goija of two, which was intersecting with Ren's scale of six. Jazhea shunned the leviathan, letting the bettor claim the detriment to his score.

"Well, well, so the woman has an edge in her game." Ioz jested freely, he was aware that though this was a game of chance, some strategy would be required to win the round.

"Not as much as she hopes I bet, we're still winning." Ren regrettably mused, he kept quiet but wondered if this was the right thing to be doing.

"The Black Conch!" Ioz pretended to act stunned and disgruntled by Jazhea's next move. He had been forced to lay down the second leviathan to claim the figurehead card.

"Maybe this will win me something." Jazhea chimed again. Ioz was trying to harpoon the moon. No wonder it was so easy for him to lose his gold to Zoolie, he knew nothing of what a game face was. Jazhea looked at her hand. She intended to put down the dagron-of-two instead of the leviathan-of-three, which would have prevented Ioz from obtaining a chain to win the game. Her desire was unmet, her fingers groped for the suit she wished. "Sorry, I have to take a break." Jazhea solemnly excused herself as she closed her eyes, she tried to cover them but notably failed. Ren and Tula noticed a fit from the glassy-eyes before she returned to normalcy moments later. She blinked her now active lids and proudly slammed down a dagron suit. Tula played the landshark-of-three, but Ioz slapped down a leviathan.

"Well, looks like we've won. Good game." Ioz confidently proclaimed victory, fetching the spoils from a gifting Jazhea.

"Well, I think Ioz cheated. You could have at least given the girl a fair chance. She's down on her luck after all, and like what you were doing wasn't obvious." Tula provided her unsatisfactory with her companion's penchant for competition.

"Congratulations, now you've won from me fair and square. Very good playing skills you have, I don't usually lose. Well, sometimes I do, I can't lie, but I'm more like a yuugla in a goija-pool here...If you know what I mean." Jazhea beamed of innocence, knowing she had successfully thrown the game for Ren.

"Likewise. I'm surprised. You must be a fast learner, Jazhea. Conch Hearts is a Janda-town exclusive, I didn't know how to play until Ioz taught me his favorites, and you were doing so well. Such daring comes in handy on our crew." Ren truthfully praised, still feeling somewhat aberrant about her circumstance.

"Until I lost." Jazhea airily stuck out her tongue. "It would be hard to mop down this daring slug-bait!" She pried crazy eyes at her shoe and mocked with a trite laugh. Ren and Ioz exchanged glances and stalled in granting her perplexed faces. "I mean, Zoolie does a lovely job keeping his tavern slug-free, don't you agree?" She awkwardly giggled.

"I can agree with that, woman." Ioz crossed his arms and chuckled. "Psst, Ren." He resumed his veiled scorn. "She's poor like we are. Don't we have a Quest we need to return to? If you want to risk your neck then do it on your own ship-! Taking her aboard could put us in danger. That claim of hers about trying to get back at Bloth alone is mighty hopeful too." Ioz skeptically slammed his gut feeling.

"All the more reason we can use her help, and she can use ours. You must have a very hard time risking your neck for a ship you paid for." Ren intelligently evinced.

"Ren. I don't know who she is, but I don't think there's anything reputable about that woman. There's something I don't trust about...the way she smiles, scowls. Something I remember...I don't know from where, but I don't like it. Call it pirate's intuition, these eyes can see deceit. Ask the eco-woman's opinion." Ioz whispered a harsh disagreement to the regal. He starkly dismissed the vagrant to Ren, but evened in temperament.

"I should be going! I'm sure there's more valuables I can forage for!" Jazhea tripped off into the night as she bid her unwelcome farewell. Ren watched her run off into the pitch shade of Janda-town once more, a yelp and an unfortunate fall dribbled from her shape through the window.

"Ren, your eyes and ears betray you! Tell me you won't buy into this trickery." Ioz's aghast mannerisms pleaded, the inkling of consternation threading a savvy grit. He urged Ren to withdraw his proposal.

"How do you know she's lying, Ioz? She's helpless. She needs someone, and she can't harm us! Just look! I know that we'll be taking a chance but if she truly knows something about my Father and I don't trust her, then I won't be able to learn about my past, the original Quest for the Treasures. She'll just stay with us for a little while, until we reach the lighthouse. That's long enough to know if she can give us any clues, and I'm sure Jenna will know what to do. Jazhea wouldn't just tell us everything, and then have us call her a liar." The good-natured prince argued over the disharmony of minds, keeping his volume chary.

Ren was aware Ioz often saw women differently than he did other men and could have easily assumed was the reason for the ragtag sailor's gripe but the clever leader knew better of the vulnerable guest. Her note she had wedged inside his boot, a distress signal scrawled on the underside of the Black Conch.

"That's enough of this. I need to know everything I can for this journey." Ren tactfully hushed, he whisked the unwilling Ioz out-of-the-way. "We'll take you with us to Octopon." He pivoted back to Jazhea out the door and met the abstract female's peacock-greens, confronting her. He had coaxed her back inside while he awaited her reply.

"Well, I don't really have any other destination, though I do have a means of transportation. I'll show you." Jazhea volunteered to trot ahead, unhindered as she silently debarked and led the four out of the lodge. Niddler schlepped the Treasure as the other three reclaimed their weapons and departed, saying their last emphatic goodbyes and well-wishes to Zoolie; they followed her out into port where she introduced her vessel.

"Meet Beesall! The best-smelling dagron to glide over the twenty seas! Yeeehoo!" Jazhea proudly simpered, beckoning to a twiggy dagron she had tethered to a post of the dock. It emitted a fearsome growl and she patted it on its scaly nose. From her waist she withdrew a lasso of lizard skin, into the midnight breeze it coiled. Looping it around Beesall's mane, she cartwheeled to board the mare's back as would a seacow girl.

"Noy jitat! She's keeping something rare like a dagron as a pet?! It smells like an ordinary dagron to me. Is it even hers?" Ioz raved in exasperation. "I don't like this at all, lad." He darkly uttered to the kingly descendant next to him.

"You don't have any problems stealing things for us. Remember a pirate can't survive on suspicions alone." Ren bantered in response, he gandered at his comrade with a witty smirk. Ioz was forced to relent to his captain's ambition yet again, he perceived Ren's insecurity as well. Ren approached the beast and found that it was not vicious, but well-trained.

The prince shot a prudent stare at the creature. "If this is your only transportation, then I can see why you were having trouble. Perhaps you'll tell us later how you obtained such an uncommon beast. We can go back to my ship. It will be easier to travel that way." Ren conducted the luckless lady and her dagron back to the Wraith, the others traversing behind.

The band of adventurers loaded some supplies from town on board, ready to cast off. Niddler assisted with the packing, hefting some food crates below deck. Jazhea's dagron gnarled at him and he lobbed with a panic, spilling the goods. He took off screaming and fluttered up to the mast. "He scares me, and I'm not loading any more of this slop!" He yammered in a flurry, vocally upset.

"It won't hurt you, Niddler." Ren briskly encouraged the monkeybird. He scurried to pick up the packages Niddler had dropped and ran them for the hold to finish the job. He motioned to Jazhea. "We'll be casting off soon, if you're tired you can go into the quarters below or you can stay out here." He authorized a rest while taking various things into the cellar.

"I'm not that tired, I'll stay out here." The outsider indifferently answered him.

"Oh. Right." Ren was muddled as the water about the interesting relation, happening to glance at her with hat at bay and pressed in fingertips. The moonlight gleamed on her stark facade, giving her light braids a pretty glow. It shone off dark skin, and her features were a lot as his own handsome, but barely picturesque. She appeared unmistakably older, if only by a few years. He scampered to tug on the line from the dock to pull out.

"So I guess a room in Janda-town isn't good enough for these chunga-lungas? Where is your nearest village, wharf-rats?" Ioz crinkled a rash brow and blockaded the twiggy refugees, who ran to board soon after.

"Lus-nayi won't be accepted in our village because of what happened...and I refuse to leave her! I'll jump overboard in her place, if you want me to!" Joiquiva furled her arms out like a shield, avowing kindred loyalty to her peer in the face of death.

"You're asking orphans who were slashed by pirates to fight for their wages in Janda-town? Don't be ridiculous, Ioz, they need a proper home." In the midst of withholding her displeasure at Ioz's selfishness, Tula knelt as she tested a line. Pushing a crate to her arms, she finished the end of her workload. "How can anyone not let their own people back into their home? That is horrendous injustice." Tula stared at the Quiin natives, she could not comprehend that kind of cruelty.

"Only the Highest Order of Imperial Qui-Qua and the Clerics from the Sainthood of Toiishuk can admit outsiders." Joiquiva shamefully confessed the reality of her oath to the community order of their birthplace. Even if they were to be pardoned by the highest authority they would never be inside the realm of public admission again because of this scourge they were placed under, neither Lus-nayi or family would amount to any more than outcast class.

Lus-nayi recalled the pirate Mantus's grasp on her throat. Then she saw a diced vision when Joiquiva carried her out of the hut. They were everywhere alone but with this unimaginable crew, at present point still no one else could guess the terrors the survivors of the Bentaar raid saw and felt that day.

"Well, no one is jumping overboard. They're staying here. For, as long as they need to." Ren determined his direction as he firmly decided for the rejects' live.

"You know the ebb and flow of the tide is unfair, Tula. You off-the-wind-kooky boy, we don't have room to board permanent guests. We should just leave them but...they'll stay so as long as they make more of that Puuka-chops-prawn casserole, for me. I'm headed to bed. Niddler and Tula will stay on watch." The toughened pirate shrugged, and could not be bothered to eject the duo.

"The Wraith?" Tula responded in a snap. She was not at all surprised Ioz could not keep his momentum.

"Keep 'her in shape for me." Ioz durably issued the noble farewell, roaming for a room inside the foundation of the ship to sleep. "That's the first peaceful dagron I've ever seen, couldn't have come under Mantus's lash." He monitored the reptile with a pacified breath before he glanced distrustfully at the visitor. Then he resumed his patter, embracing his florid coat.

"I will. Tell Joiquiva and Lus-nayi the fore'peak hammocks are for them." Ren signaled and affirmatively nodded his head, he then riled the wheel. He drew out a short distance from port. Jazhea met him, leaning on a railing that guarded the upper-deck. Though the naive exiles were less trusting overall, the village tongues left whispering about the unknown princess in the last vanishing of their feathered hair as they snuck for the ladder behind the nearest bulkhead.

"Evelyn." The gilded passenger said, her breath rigid.

"Huh?" Ren puzzled, looking inquisitive.

"That was our mother's name. Or so I was told..." Jazhea droned to a feasible low, she bore into nothingness. "Evelyn Primus." Attractively, she smiled.

"Oh." Ren bent a glim downward, and then at Jazhea. It became apparent that she knew a lot for someone whom Ioz deemed unrelated to him and who, Ren himself carried reservations about. "What did you know about her? You said you didn't remember what she was like, or our brothers." The royal boy wondered, wishing to know more.

"She died for our home. Liken to our father, Primus, she gave all the strength she could against the raiders while he set out on the Quest and even before Octopon was razed. In our Octopon I learned of Vaecusa, my appointed guardian. Aunt helped our father, when he defended Octopon against the main enemies of the throne during his coronation years with the kindness of his words. Sir Phorlock assisted in raising my cousin and I, on Kalinda with her. The Ruins of Taikal were such a disappointment to not visit on such a ceremonious occasion as the Five-hundredth Moonsail Festival of Octopon, dagrons swarm to the mist in heaps because of the strange reactions from the runes and I would have loved to give my Beesall what she likes. I've only visited once." She settled with a veiled and pensive summary, ending as Ren sealed his lip to think about this.

"Our late-aunt, Vaecusa is gone, but you haven't found her? After we met I would think Jenna would have told you anything you told me if Vaecusa was taken by the sea." Ren asked to forfeit all shade, showing her a steady pry.

"Vaecusa lost her husband to The Eyes of the Fallen Captain, fiery eyes in the sky above which sink ships, but from him she knew about a Secret Scroll that our father wrote. He and father worked together. Vaecusa was a warrior true, I believed she would have lost her life in a fight. So that is how I say it, in a manner of respect. In reality I don't know any more than you do, not beyond her monetary reasons for leaving home. I saw your guardian once or twice, some yesterday before the Day of Fire on Octopon and never after. It all goes black." Jazhea confirmed to a wit, Ren bemused over her words. The plaits reminded him of a girl at the lighthouse when he was still a child, but this was eminently long ago. The pause of unfamiliarity settled through the air for an interval.

"Then you knew more about our family than I did. My entire youth was spent in the lighthouse, never knowing anything about my past." Ren mused as he evoked the wheel with a turn, although they were only drifting along the tide. "Can you bare a hand? I'm not sure what in Septopon's sea-pooch Niddler is up to now...You just pull on the rope a little tigh-" He flit weary eyes for the missing winged-advocate. To his curiosity, Jazhea not only supported his request but she seemed to know what she was doing, albeit not very well. "This is not the first time you've sailed on a real ship?" He numbed his interest.

"No." Under a crisp look Jazhea gently hauled the tall cord, granting a simple reply.

"Your necklace..." Ren blinked as he observed the jade adornment under the shining moonlight, a flat orb that was so familiar. His guest had revealed it.

"This? It's a friendship pendant given to me by my bestfriend at the time, but it's more of a memorial than anything. It protects me from all forms of danger." Jazhea described briefly the object rung on her high collar, creaking a dim smile. She swung the dull stone and the attached fan, Merrian gold-leaf. The common jewelry was translucently tarnished from several years' use. One fragment of parallel to a swimming fish's gossamer eye was embedded into the ornament, to his reaction it was melded to be nothing like the Compass of Rule or any other rare stone. It didn't look liken to anything Ren had ever seen.

"Really...a memorial for who?" Ren pondered nimbly. "Don't mind Ioz, he is always very distrustful. I know it seems like he doesn't like you, but I'm sure he'll come around when he sees you mean us no harm. He was like that with Tula at first too, until he learned she's valuable to us like I'm sure in time you...Will be." He heeded this new visitor in a closer light. Nothing at first appeared amiss with the unfeminine woman other than her clothes and a similar athleticism, but she seemed to have been through rough wear from some misplaced conflict. Bevys of vertical scabs lined her back. He noticed the disgusting scar on a mangled shoulder before she daintily twisted her tunic from notice. The icy frown she bore did not help the wouldbe appealing-charm.

"Uhuh." Jazhea concurred in a slow parting of lips. She coughed after speedily circling her head and diverting attention away. "I think I will find a bed. Goodnight, brother." She bade him goodbye, curling a delicate smile. Ren felt droll when she called him her brother, it didn't feel natural.

"Goodnight." The prince swiveled a bronzed face to watch her disappear into the hidden chamber.

Ren admired above the double-moons beaming hugely over the horizon, now an everlasting height in the sky. The Wraith rocked gently in the night, the breeze was mute as the shimmering stars cast above, and reminded him of home. Tula and Niddler must have gone to sleep thinking he and Ioz were still awake. It had been too late before he could feel the exhaustion, which overtook him as well. His head rested on the spokes of the helm under his crossed arms, a scarce instant passed before his mind crashed.

Two figures basked on a dock in a foreign city as the two moons levitated overhead. Ore glinted from piles of rubble. The air brimmed with a coarse discussion.

"What brings you to Kalinda?" With a growl, the harsh voice inquired of another.

"Why, I imagine the same reason that brings you here." The second odious-entity, a puny in size compared to the prior replied in a shoddy and shrill pitch. Sleazy presentation surrounded his certain words. Few people stood behind his back, but at a broader distance away from him. He crossed his arms, unyielding in some appeal. The noisy sound of a click thumped in the desolation.

The primary negotiator waited to analyze this attraction. "Perhaps we can make a deal." The form's supplicated impression echoed through a curb in thought. "I'll allow you a ship and escort, but you must bring him back. He, and the Treasure he carries. Understood?" The sinister proposition churned over the immediate and voided draft.

"I like the cut of your sail, sir, but hey, how about a little gold for my troubles...and, incidentals? Say, about three-hundred?" The sly ruffian cunningly jostled his audience.

"I can get that much by selling the blasted boy's ship!" The first criminal returned in irritation.

"Alright, alright, two-hundred?" The shrewd con haggled on. Loud clacking pounded twice.

"You're already getting enough from me, Joat. You have the use of my ships, my men, and your right to the boy's ship upon returning him to me." The abraded oppressor gnarled back. Joat paused to devise.

"I'll need some...supplies." Joat cackled in gusto while the chrome pincer that connected to his arm clanked again. "One-hundred-fifty and I'll ask for no more." The nasal outlaw urged once more.

"Eighty." The disgruntled offer of the prior buccaneer augmented a say.

"One-hundred." Joat grinned with a prompt.

"Deal." The clamoring plunderer at last agreed with a repelling grunt. "But, I expect the boy, his crew, and all of his Treasure. I want you to bring him to my ship, I trust you to be proficient. You'll have to work for your coin." He ended his circumstantial arrangement, speaking with all the reasonableness his kind could gather.

"Agreed, Bloth." Joat fervently replied with a blustered snicker. "This will be more fun than a Janda-town carnival in springtime!" The metal-hand expelled one more baleful click. Bloth reeled back to his station as the vengeful ex-shipowner slunk off townbound with his crew. Mantus exchanged stares with an eye-level Konk, the chunky underling's ego shrunk at the reemergence of a threatening master to the gangplank of the Maelstrom.

The sun started to rise as Ren's water-imbued eyes trembled open from a sleep.

Ren literally had fallen asleep at the wheel of the ship and found himself plunked on the floor. His nape had twisted into an irritating kink, he stroked the back of his neck with a groan. He startled himself awake and scanned around for any sign of threat, he saw none. The Wraith appeared to be scattered somewhere out in the expanse of sea. He pushed up to begin steering. He then saw something of sinking goop creeping toward the port of the craft, he let out a jolted gasp. "Noy jitat! Dark water, off port'side!" Ren's blue eyes flashed wide as he swore under a wheeze. He powerfully hugged the spindle to drive the ship away. Pounding immediately ripped through the atmosphere, the sea below pulled violently with treacherous waves. Then, a colossal silver and violet-scaled beast bludgeoned through the water. It struck up into the air and crashed back down, forcefully enough to prematurely tip the Wraith. Not long after that, another enormous monster hailed from the sea. "Leviathans!" Ren desperately cried out as he deftly rushed to drive the sailing transport away from turmoil. Thankfully, the rumble had been considerable and spaced the vessel out just far enough from the foul trap. "We must have disturbed their nest. Noy jitat." He cursed in depletion, clenching his teeth and bitter at himself for sleeping on the job. Something emerging from the inside stopped his idea.

Ioz scrambled out from below. "Ren! By the two moons what was that?" Ioz bounded out of the cuddy, sword ready to maul. He saw the leviathans jumping up out of the water. "Noy jitat, Ren! Chungo lungo! Scot pango on a sea-slug's backside, where on Mer did you steer us to?! We're on a jitatan bed of leviathans!" He scorched out like he would if he were being chased by the Dark Dweller and barging Ren out of the way, he abducted the wheel. Before he could reprimand the well-known prince, the hull underwent a lurch and it flung Ren against the protective railing. In another instant, the youth was bumped off and straight into a mount of dark water. "Ren!" The pirate tumultuously screamed. Right when it happened, Tula raced to the proximity. Her eyes widened in terror, hand covering her mouth in an inescapable gasp.

"What in the eight wonders is going on? Morning brother. Hey, where are we? I hear leviathans, they're far away, right?" The new visitor had been the last to awaken with a start, she sought Ren, who she could not focus her eyes on. The eccentric guest yawed her gaze to her surroundings. She noticed they were exceedingly different from the night before as she focused on the patch of blackness that aimed to swallow Ren. It had already encased every part, save to the midriff. "Noy jitat! Brother, we've got to help him!" She lamented after a contentious intervention, dire as she dashed to the nearby helm.

Ren screamed endlessly, fighting through all he could to escape the entrapping clutches of the ghastly muck. He occupied the Compass above the water, despairingly ready to toss it. He felt a terrible tendril latch on to the hand that clutched the blue gem inside, debilitating him. He cried out with desperation. Painfully, he exerted to keep his head above which would be his, and the Quest's, only hope. "Ioz, wake Niddler, tell him to take the Compass!" He pleaded in agony to the navigator, witnessing the dip of himself into a terrified torment. His waist stayed submerged, deep in demise. He started to sink fast. Too fast.

"Noy jitat! Hold on!" In urgency Ioz yelled back to Ren. "Tula, steer it close!" Ioz issued the severe order and careered to the compartment to rouse the half-zonked monkeybird whom apparently laid outcold like a stack of Draja-fruit. "Get off your lazy feathers and get the Treasure you stupid rudderless-jitatan-monkeybird! Ren overboard! Dark water!" He rushed at Niddler to get up, not sparing any feelings and grabbing him by the scuff of the neck. The avian barely managed a huh before becoming shocked into action. "Hurry!" He stormily flurried after, beating his sword against the door. He cursed as the ship buckled again, being slammed by another sea-serpent.

"I've got it!" Niddler shrilled, chasing the rolling Treasure around on the board. He finally caught it. He soared as fast as he could assemble his motion for the trapped Ren, who was treading the midst of losing any stability that endured.

"Someone...get the Compass!" Ren panted in laden wait, he held on with the last strength left in his remaining hand and barely his head when he became overpowered by the caging ooze.

"I can help this!...I think! Steer clear! I'll try to get him out of this ballast-scum!" Jazhea's eyes flared as she mounted her dagron and flew to hover over her trapped relation. "Grab on!" She shouted below her, just as Ren's hand began to flood.

Ren did not let go of the cerulean relic. He speedily enabled a grip on to the dagron's ankle as he felt the rest of his head being smothered to the squashing mass. He could not speak and his vision had started to fade. Niddler maneuvered in without an instant to dally, lowering the weighty sphere into the pool of sludge as the royal's clamped hand began to recoil from the reptilian ankle. Ren felt his muscles stop resisting when the gook surrounding him started to part, and he limply fell into the crystal-blue sea water. Jazhea reached down a palm, which he clamped on to and pulled himself up. He flipped backward to the dagron's aft in an acrobatic feat, with the help from two pairs of wings. "Thanks, Niddler. And Jazhea." Out of breath, he barely managed to squeeze out. Ren gawked at the hardy waif who had helped him. The dagron dove down and then spun up to return to the bow.

"Thanks Jazhea, you saved these wings a lot of wear!" Niddler chirped out, happily relieved. Jazhea shone a grin at the monkeybird. In the air, Ren saw the Wraith heave and sway as more peeved leviathans rocketed up and out of the water. His eyes flashed stone, one of the beasts gaped a serpent's mouth open to make Jazhea's dagron lunch. Piercing like the wind were the orphans' shrieks from the deck of the Wraith.

PART 2 - Jazhea's Eyes

"Jazhea, leviathan from starboard!" Ren directed a tardy signal to the pilot, who was evidently flying en route to carnage.

Crashing of an altitude of coral hit the waves. Shards broke to dust and filled the blue with bubbles and foam, the leviathan slowed as it drew nearer. With a spin, Jazhea managed to steer the scaly creature out-of-the-way.

"That rock! Does it do anything?!" Jazhea retched out in the midst of an adrenaline jolt. Ren seemed stammered when he shook his head. "Well it must be speeding us up or slowing them down! I don't think we'd still be flying! I can't see-!" With a scraggy declaration she abraded her fear. Before the instant Ren and Niddler would be gulped, the driver's senses were absent. The jaw of the silver monster had paused along with it's body, no longer a peril in it's pursuit of the dagron's tail. Beesall was rolling so much that she would have knocked the passengers from her back. She landed square on the vibrant flat of the Wraith. Only a moment were they allowed to catch a breather before the pounding started again.

"How?" Ren stunted his nerve, then he noticed something only he must have alone been able to witness. Surrounding the orb of the Treasure, was a boundary of power. Not one small, but seemingly as ample as the Wraith itself. He did not feel a stranger to the concept that he could have been walking to Ad infinitum in Arakna's caves. However, he was not sure of the idea the Treasure could have been changing the time to movement for everything contained within it's zone of control or shifting the external atmosphere, perhaps even the very motions of the waves. Nor Ioz or Tula had said a word about anything he had been personally afflicted by.

"Is someone going to tell me why we're so far off-course? Why was Ren left alone last night?" Tula furiously hollered from the wheel while the deck sloped and almost careened. Niddler slid along the wood floor, all but unable to keep footing. Ren and Jazhea held to the dagron that was claw-gripping the surface.

"I made a mistake!" Ren called back guiltily, not able to go into detail by the fact that he had overestimated his fortitude.

"It was partially my fault!" Jazhea gleaned in to take some of the blame in her waking.

Ren blinked at her peculiarly.

"Well you can tell us about it later!" Tula let out, hectically leading the ship. "Full sail! We need to outrun them and head East!" She dealt to Ioz, who positioned himself up the mast and just below the crow's nest to watch out ahead.

"We're not that far off-course, and no! We need to wait it out and go North, woman!" Ioz argued with demanding pretentiousness. "Chungo lungo! We need to get out of here or we're all going to die!" He painstakingly ranted as another ocean-dweller jostled the bulwark, causing him to swear and adhere his arms to the post.

"How far off-course are we, Ioz?" Ren amplified up from the floor below.

"West of Octopon, by the wind!" The treasure-hunter shouted back from overhead. He slid down the mast with a flapping of vibrant stripes and fought motion on wobbly legs to recover the helm from Tula.

If that were true they weren't far off direction, they only needed to go to the lighthouse so he could return the Treasure for safekeeping. "Wait Ioz, we'll go East! We need to head home." Ren nimbly commanded, he hobbled off from the dagron's back and tried to vamoose his route toward the wheel. Jazhea made her path up as well, she wrestled to keep her balance on the floorboards and looped her scale rope on spar to swing from. She jumped off where the three gathered.

"We can make our way there, once we get off this jitatan swarm! Chungo-lungo! Someone needs to be at the sail, Tula! That or try to reason with these oversized-eels!" Ioz flustered to drive North in attempt to skitter away from the leviathan herd, worried it would damage the ship. Timber creaked underneath his feet as the quick vessel teetered.

"I might have to!" Tula nettled as she fumbled to arrange the quarrelsome sail into a favorable tacking. "Ay jitata!" She vehemently cursed. Ioz's suggestion then became moot as the leviathans remained in close range, but began to decelerate. The wavering extinguished only meagerly. Tula achieved a fix at full gale.

"So we're near Octopon, home..." Jazhea delicately hummed. Ren focused an attentive glance at her, she caught him in the intent of galloping to the rig to help Tula. "I haven't been there since so long ago." Her words inflected of hopefulness.

Ren paused as the waves rocked beneath the ship, he was going to say something. He considered only in his mind to recount his ventures for the Treasures and the restoration of over half of Octopon, but he stopped hesitant.

Tula and Ioz were reacting differently to him since this new skill he had been bestowed with, Ren could tell. Niddler seemed to be behaving more apprehensively. He reached Tula's vicinity and bore a hand with the tacking, brows fazing above at the boom. He viewed another vehicle over the horizon making headway at a steady speed, but it was not the Maelstrom. His skylight eyes narrowed to slits as he tried to form it out. "By the Eight Forbidden Seas, there's a ship approaching!" The Octopian lad alerted hardly, pointing to the disturbance in the distance.

"Aye, Ren?" Ioz wondered and swerved his head to the direction of Ren's sign, staggered but distressed. The frame drew tighter to the line, a smaller boat adjacent to the one spotted also became apparent.

Tula scaled the net up to the crow's nest. She arrested a looking-glass and eyed the oncoming ship. "It's Joat!" With capacious eyes she notified to the assemblage beneath. She caught sight of the man with the head of a mutant-muzzle and the mechanical hand, the vengeful seadog and scorned ex-owner of the Wraith. She then peered at the sleeker ship. "He has Konk with him! A still-tall Konk!" She wrought the unpleasant news from aloft, and shimmied down.

"Noy jitat! Is there any end to these kreld-eaters?" Ioz slapped his hand to his forehead, expressing drained grievances. There would be no hope of using the glider in this situation; the ships were far from land, and the leviathans were still at bay. After smacking his swelling head to the board as he slipped on waxing seaweed-sediments he slurred with fluster at the cleaning twins. "Have you ever worked a day in your lily-livered lives? I can't walk on this smilge-deck!" He vented at Joiquiva and Lus-nayi, who were scrubbing as hard as they could.

"Now is not the time." Ren simpered at the streaming rapids.

The idea then hit Ioz, he developed a plan. "Ren! Niddler! We're going to try to use these waves from the leviathans to our advantage. We just need a little more wind behind our sails and distance between and we can outrun them. Go out and distract them. It'll slow them down so they can't see what we're doing. Only throw the excess on the deck, not the essential supplies, go now! Quickly!" He rushed to the two as Tula tugged upon the rope to entrap the Westbound wind for swift running through the drift. "Those dartha-eels are in for one jitatan sea-maze." He muttered with a concentrating air under his breath.

"More flying? Again?" Niddler unluckily griped.

"Let's get them, Niddler!" Ren inspired with a wily smile as he seized many unneeded, random objects in his arms. The monkeybird lifted him off.

Jazhea dashed to her dagron and mounted. "There has to be something I can do!" The sportive guest hurried out before she took to the air, joining them as they hovered spot over the stern of the Wraith.

"These girls are useful!" No one had noticed the labor invested with her savvy skill but Lus-nayi had been weaving as Ioz discovered. The jib-cloth for spare she finished sewing of, and as it was raised the waterline byway zoomed by like a wildfire's blaze, swifter in fast-running than ever before.

"What are those barnacle-brains doing?! On my ship!" Joat stared into his eyeglass at the Wraith, where he observed the show of Ren and Niddler with an erratic dagron doing a fascinating sky-dance. Objects hurled in his direction, a decrepit shoe whooshed at his head and tossed his unusual hat behind him. "Noy borga! I'll shred them like a sun-bleached sail, they'll learn my waters run deep!" He immediately pulled the telescope away from his face, almost throwing it with enraged frustration. The largest of Bloth's scout-ships and the scantier one at the margin buckled and collided as a nearby leviathan leapt up and out of the water, causing a sieging vibration. Joat used his metal hand to grip on to the side of the ship as his crew braced for their fall.

"Ahhh!" Screamed Konk as he crashed to his face on the spindly boat next to Joat's vessel. "How far away is Maelstrom?" The flabbergasted piglet badgered.

"Too far away to help us!" The equine-head sorely neighed back.

The Wraith at last began to ease upon smooth tide, the leviathans appeared distracted with a new target. "Ahh, by chunga, it worked. We gave them the slip, for now." Ioz strummed as he shifted his eyes at the treacherous waters the enemies had recently fallen upon. Ren and the monkeybird floated to a landing on the floorboards of the Wraith, Jazhea dismounted.

"You're very brave, Jazhea." Ren commented at his backer's bold actions in something of bedazzled surprise, this was the second time on their way she had helped out.

"Don't thank me, it was Beesall who did all the work. Leviathans are nothing but slimy maggots you know, it's a good thing we made it out." The noble stranger lauded with a cheer as she stroked her dagron.

"I'm not sure if I agree with you on that, I used to feel the same about dagrons until I learned what it was like to have to live like one. Can you show me how on Mer you learned those moves? I've never seen anyone who flies so well on a dagron, except maybe Bloth's men. Beesall is a lot...friendlier though." Ren quizzically awed. Jazhea almost possessed a special skill in the same way that Avagon did. Being masterful with a dagron was indeed a rare talent and she would probably be perfected in dagron aeronautics, if not for her prior failure.

"Well. I was trained from an early age. Maybe I'll teach you sometime." Jazhea worded with a smug expression.

Ren gathered an aspect of something hidden, he sensed she wouldn't prolong in detail. He noticed she continued to fiddle with her memorial ornament. Ioz guided the ship to horizons beyond. Catching an assuaging deal of sea-breeze, they would likely be ahead of the game, at least for a little while.

"I thought you said Vaecusa was a warrior in our family, not a dagron-rider." Ren studied Jazhea's clueless face, affirming what she told of earlier.

"She was, and she knew great people. Some of them were with Pri-" The sporty maiden started to say before being curtailed by the Compass going off. It signaled toward a location that was arriving up ahead.

"Ah?" Ren exclaimed in a quiet stupor, surprised by the event. "The Compass, it's pointing to that land up North!" He piped aloud, pointing enthusiastically.

"What in the twenty seas is that?" Jazhea asked with an unnerved tremor, tipping a bewildered brow. She observed the Compass heedfully, never having seen anything like it before.

"This? This is the Compass our Father Primus left to me, to find the Thirteen Treasures he sought to stop the dark water." Ren told her conclusively. "Don't you know about our father's Quest?" He pried her with careful eyes, insinuating an ado of her ignorance.

"The Quest for the Treasures? Oh, I do. Well, that's what I was told. I've never seen anything like that before, that's the Compass of Rule?" Jazhea questioned arduously, both inquisitive and revealing in words. She scrunched her eyes at the interesting token of aquamarine.

"The Compass of Rule?" So she knew of it, Ren reflected. "Yes, he passed it on along with his journey to me, to find them to restore our home. I've already found nine of the Thirteen needed." He cordially disclosed. He felt for once that he could be open with her.

"Really? It really works? Oh, brother, I haven't seen Octopon in so long." Jazhea warily drew in air. She gazed with a static longing, her face wore an uncanny and flinty expression.

"Ren, hurry up! We need to catch this zephyr or we'll be blown off-course again!" Tula whipped Ren a lively reminder of reality, summoning him to the block-and-tackle rig. The yearning lad had made another error. Ren corrected his blunder with a minor easement. They had indeed missed the route they wished to waft for, an insignificant curb in direction couldn't cause too much damage.

"Octopon..." Ren momentarily considered. He passed to focus on Ioz, who continued forward to the newly peaking land. "How far is home?" He examined while in deep ponder.

"South. We're too far North now." Ioz avouched from his stance on the steering. "Scot pango! If this dark water doesn't let up, we won't be able to go anywhere." He let the expletives fly, twisting the ship in all angles and fighting to escape the blackened liquid that began to swarm from around the vessel. "A little help, your highness?" He shouted with an irate grumble. Ren was changing slightly.

"Then we'll go North. To the Treasure." Ren was driven when he voiced the preceding ambition. He inwardly struck himself with tense embarrassment, somehow notions of home wouldn't stop imposing on him. He jounced forward to shift on the line.

"You'll have to wait until we steer us out of here, Ren. The jitatan stuff is everywhere." Ioz tousled a different direction each time, moving apart in a narrower space at every whirl. "I've never seen so much dark water in one place in all my days of sailing the twenty seas!" He did not exaggerate, the entire watery mass laid out before him flourished with the imperfectly blotched whole of dark water.

"Ioz! Dark water!" Tula apprised from adjusting the sails, sprinting up deck in warning.

"We're already on it, Tula." Ioz reported morbidly. His mind affixed in onerous concentration.

The dark water split and lashed, moving as if it infused a capacity of it's own. "Tula, I have an idea. Come on." Ren sprung up by a renewed will, pulling the forest-eyed lass toward the edge of the deck. "Keep steering, Ioz!" He ordered back to the pilot. Ren nestled the Treasure in his arms. "Use this rope to hold me up, I'll clear it away." He flagged the unit of cord to her.

"Be careful, Ren." Tula supported him by his lashed feet, wrung around the bottommost latch and off the ship as Ren dunked the Treasure into the black force. The tendrils whipped at waxen hair as the wind blew and slashed at his form. Increasingly, the evil melted and cleared a spot for the Wraith, Tula dragged the regent back up as an undimmed area of water began to spread.

"Noy jitat." Ren cursed with agitation. "With this dark water we can't take the Treasure back." He glared at the innumerable span of the dark water surrounding them. "I believe we'll get stuck out here. We'll have to head toward the 10th Treasure of Rule, and then return this one." Ren pensively secured the Treasure in his tight wrap, surmounting to the burdensome conclusion. Jazhea peeked at him.

"It's a little too late for that, we've got company!" Tula clamored in alarm of the offending sight that was charging itself in to close range. Joat and Konk had caught up with them, wrangling through the thin patch of water that had been purified.

"Kreld-eaters! They don't give up!" Anxious and frantic, Ren blared. He grit his teeth as he scattered to the rail.

"We're not going to be able to outrun them forever at this rate. The ship is slowed! We need to toss some supplies if we don't want them on us like a dagron-feeding-frenzy!" Ioz commanded affirmatively from the helm.

"We don't have much to toss!" Ren fiercely hollered back.

"We don't have much choice!" Ioz returned after, grimly scouring the stretch toward the field of water dabbled with a catastrophe of black.

"Wait." Jazhea said at whim, lucidly immediate. "I'll go. The dagron should take some weight off your ship." She spoke up as she solemnly peered at Ren.

"We'll still have to lose them anyway! Dead astern!" Tula imperiously called out.

"What about the nets, Ren?!" Joiquiva wallowed as she helped her weak twin in skinning the fresh hull of goija-biters.

"Leave it or leave your heads in the Dark Dweller's bowels." Ioz callously spared no request. With resentment the orphans sent the Wraith's surplus of chomping fish to the depths.

"Ioz, don't give them that. Good job, Joiquiva and Lus-nayi." Ren cooled the helmsman's mettle as he applauded the sisters and ran for the observation platform. "Go? Go where?" The prince challenged his supposed sibling with impetuous daunt, not wanting to let her alone.

"Back to Octopon. It's not far from here. I need to anyway." Jazhea stiffly insisted, she looked right at him. She appeared bereaved but unshakable.

"No, I'll get us all out of here, you don't need to-" Ren resolved for an instant, they would have no choice. "Right." The prince at last ascertained. The wanderer ascended her dagron and took to the sky to fly away.

He could see her lips move as she bid him farewell from the air. Ren watched her form glide toward the otherside of the shore and then ran to yell to her.

"Jazhea! Tell Jenna I have nine!" Ren shouted out, at the end.

"You got it, Ren!" Ren heard Jazhea calling back, at least that was what his ears made out. He fleetingly followed her silhouette as it disappeared under the sinking orange sun. Now the Wraith moved faster, but the pursuers behind them were still gaining.

"We're going as fast as we can but we can't outrun them!" Tula terrifically blazoned, yanking on a sail as much as she could to mold it to conduct the wind. Moments passed before the ships were in range of close sight. Unluckily, the Wraith met a dead end, blocked by a patch of dark grime.

"Treasure or less sail!" Ioz thundered with a steely grimace from the wheel, unfeasibly managing to rip away from jeopardy in time. Disastrously, open waters stayed obstructed for too long of a time. He was too conclusive, and Ren hadn't been acting enough on the Wraith's behalf.

Joat and Konk grinned caustically from the zooming dinghies. "We've got you now, dartha-eels! You, and my ship!" Joat wrought a sly grin and snickered evilly as a seasucker launched from the plumper of the scout-ships.

"Heh, heh. Konk will get big reward for jitata boy and Treasure!" Konk verbalized with a bumbling chuckle, climbing on to the line that attached to the adventurer's skiff.

"You can keep your reward." Joat sniggered in remark. "I already have mine!" The claw-handed scamp hooked his metal limb to the wire, zipping down it like a pulley.

"Ay chunga!" Ren grimly fouled. He spelled into hysteria as he attempted to saw at the cable that plastered itself to the rail of the starboard with his terse and broken blade, but it would not budge. In a flash, the hook-armed avenger was upon them while a sneaky piglet doddered up from close behind.

Joat crawled to the end of the line and with a dexterous flip, boarded the deck of the Wraith. "It's nice to see you've kept my ship in good shape, Ioz, but I think it's about time I have a chance to use it!" The cretin-headed raider clicked his claw menacingly, seething hatred in his stare. He advanced toward Ren, who valiantly drew his sword. The pleated clasp slung down as Ren choked the blow and somersaulted to his right side. The golden-haired man then tried to strike but was ground to a rattling impasse, foiled by a secondary weapon Joat wielded with his other hand. "It's useless, boy, this ship and everything on it belongs to me!" He cackled a heinous laugh, swinging his piercing and sharp pincer at the youth again.

"Ay chungo chipungo! Not if I have anything to say about it!" The raven-haired pirate yelled out from above. Ioz swung down from the wheel, vaulting over the high barricade as he utilized his sword. He struck at the invading freak with his curved blade. Joat deflected with a solidly-crooked paw, using it to throw Ioz back with a push. "Noy jitat!" Ioz bullheadedly swore. Tensely, he dragged up from off the ground to resume his stance. Tula joined in the fray. She flogged down from a rope, drawing her knife. She kicked Joat square in the head from the halyard, causing him to slump over.

Whopping Konk had arrived then and jockeyed to strike at Tula, who dodged. "Surrender! Foolish wench!" The pig-man spewed, unaware of her prowess.

"Where is this boy's rotten Treasure?" Joat hoofed for the hold of the Wraith before he was attacked by a divebombing Niddler, who squawked and tore at his face. The avian attempted to lift him away. He fussed in irritation and flicked the monkeybird off. More fiends from both the ships were wriggling up the appendage.

"Me don't know. Konk look for it." Konk started in a grumble and waddled for anything on board that looked like a Treasure but his hands were full with Tula, and Niddler, who attacked him now as well.

His huge skewer cast, after hauling against the ecomancer. Konk neared Tula and before a stretched clack from the blush-clothed warrior, became as no prominent threat once more. "Bloth be disappointed." Under a mere spark, he compressed into a pint-size.

"Heeheh. We don't really need to find where it is!" Joat smartly epitomized, placing the emphasis on an obligation. "We're taking this ship back anyway." He snickered with a sinister neigh.

"Not on your life!" Ioz brazenly roared, clashing his brand of might. It almost made contact before Joat fended it off. "Defend the Treasure!" He scampered about in attempt to reach the fellow deckhands, drastically tolling out a cautionary order.

"Fool pirate, do you think you can stop me? Natchut!" Joat jeered, grabbing Ioz's arm by his steel nipper and slamming him down.

"Ioz!" The concerned Tula hollered, she spun toward Joat and delivered a swift kick to his face. She thrust her fighting cutlass at his torso when he got up but her wrist became ensnared. Joat snapped her up and pelted her into the mast.

"Tula!" Ren was making a dash for his jilted friend when he felt a sting, something clipped him. He reeled back around and saw that Konk's trident pierced into the flesh of his side, he was not hurt. The piglet froze, staring at him with stunned eyes and an exaggerated frown. "Noy jitat!" Ren had been knocked off his guard when he hotly swore under his breath. Joat kept his back turned. Konk tried to perform the feat again, which Ren didn't allow. "Hurry up!" He alerted his friends with a sizzling vocal. He managed to run to Tula, but by then it was too late. Knivers from Bloth's and Joat's crews had tailed and surrounded them on the mid'ship.

Tula's eyes ferociously jarred open as she came to. Ren and Ioz were wrenched away from her. She focused her energy, she could not let it end like this. She sensed her head starting to throb, Ioz noticed her and tried to give her signal before a blunt grasp overtook her.

"Not happening, wench!" The sneaky-handed Joat gnarled as he fiendishly nabbed her by her clothe, he caught on to Tula's effort and piled her with the arrested trio upon the floor.

"Niddler, can you try to fly us?" The cornered grief at the terrifying ensemble pried the desperate request from Ren's lips.

"I can't fly both of you! Or all three of you! Kreld-flanks..." Niddler regrettably chattered, bitting his mitts.

"You won't take us alive, kreld-eaters, by my father's blood!" Ioz took a defensive stand, being the first to strike out. He swerved his blade at the mob encircling him but was quickly wrestled back. Niddler screeched and tried to take to the air but became restrained as a ruffian's hand from the swarm folded around an ankle. The aggressor swung the monkeybird underneath the crowd, which made him thump his head. Joat opened the hatch of the Wraith as the teeming pirates pounded and pushed on the three of them while Niddler was adjacent.

"I doubt that, but you can think that for yourself if you want, ship-stealing darva-waste!" Joat victoriously crowed as he punted the four of them into the cargobay, which they soon learned had been replaced with a dagron-bone cage that slapped shut upon entry. The cramped enclosure trapped the victims against each other arm to side, like goija-fish in a barrel. "Now...to find that kreld-raffendian Treasure!" The hybrid-headed schemer left the adventurers in their confines and pivoted on heel to order the looters to search the ship.

"Noy jitat...if that dartha-eel captures us I swear..." Ioz began a whisper to his shipmates.

"He's going to take us back to the Maelstrom and then we'll be..." The monkeybird blubbered, he gulped as if he couldn't dispense a lump in his throat. "Constrictus-bait...!" He timidly finished, uttering a worried chatter.

"No time to think of that now, monkeybird! We have to get out of here." Under tepid breath Ioz rambled back. He shifted to try to move his arms but found his limbs were pinned down by the extent of the cage. "By Kuunda, I should have known better than to think women were anything but bad luck...still." Though he strove to conceal his frustration, he was sure Tula heard.

"Or maybe it's that cursed coat." Someone in the lock mumbled.

"Quiet Niddler! There's nothing we can do about it now." Ren hushed a silent command to his brightly colored friend beside him, he clenched his teeth in anxiety. His worries were bigger though, he felt himself sweating waves. Konk saw him, he was positively sure of it. The kreld-eater had stricken him with a serious disaster that would have literally minced him, and he remained unfazed.

"Ugh..." Tula groaned, restless in agony. "These bars, they're too barren." She distressed, she struggled to oscillate herself more room but she only used up more of her energy. She couldn't find a fix with so many of the invaders around and she only crowded out Ren and Ioz, who were trapped on either side of her.

"Clam up down there smool-rats!" Joat clapped at the cage with his metal claw, making a loud thwack on the bars. "Where is that Trinket?" He carried away from them to blab to the multitude.

"Here! Konk find it!" The piglet secured a chainball-framed stone of enormous proportion in his grubby arms as he proclaimed his bold sentiment. He frisked to the sea and saw a familiar vessel fast approaching. "Look!" He pointed out with his other arm. "It Bloth." He chuckled amid a slow-thinking sneer.

Joat drew his vision to the nearing Maelstrom and then reverted to stare back at Konk. "I know that, you fool-headed pig-brain!" He shouted at the stubby pirate below him, fists to his hips and miffed. He eyed the clunky gem the runt had hitched in possession. "That's the Treasure?" He peeked at the object with suspicion and disdain, squinting one eye with a hard reaction.

"Yes!" The gantha-pig responded with a groaned blurt. "And it glow!" He hung the Treasure right over Ren as it glittered green. He grinned with his flabby cheeks.

Only modest stretch of distance away, the skeletal ship pushed onward through the hailing waves.

"Excellent." The captain of a gigantic sea-vessel tactfully declared. He peered at the Wraith through the looking-glass he pressed up to his visual. "He has the prince's ship." He reported with an appraising expression. After observing Joat and several men on board, he lowered his eyepiece. He spun a glance to his cohort who steered the warship. "The Treasure is ours." Bloth faced his commander whom he informed of the glorious news. Mantus grinned successfully.

The Maelstrom rowed up alongside the scout-ships and the Wraith, which caused the stagnant vessels to purl from vibration as it slowed to a halt. From the cage, the captives stirred of antsy and fearful reception. Bloth and a few trusted consorts disembarked and made their way on the measly deck. Stepping onto the schooner, it bellowed under the bulk. "I have the Treasure, Bloth! Prince Ren is in the cage, as you wanted!" The sea-camel grinned from the red boat as he retained the globular Treasure in his mitts. The pirate captain gave the jewel a once-over, slightly drooping his lip as if to expel a disbelieving tirade and then he abducted the gem, holding it under one large arm. He passed to grin at the captives stowed in the hoard of the ship, frighteningly staring detestation into their eyes.

"Very good, Joat. You've done exactly as I've asked. The ship is yours." The despicable captain praised the terrorizing mercenary and pointed a cruel glare at the tender forms of his trembling targets, eying up his prey with a distorted face. Joat excruciatingly howled, he threw a clawed hand through the air in a shining celebration.

"What about my payment?" The gloating scavenger persisted.

This interrupted Bloth's gratifying thoughts and he turned to look at the naja-shaped figure. "Ah, yes." He smiled sickeningly sweet as he rewarded his lackey, drawing out a bag of gold. "One-hundred pieces, as we agreed." He tossed the bag to the chrome-clawed cutthroat without batting a finger or lash, the amputee then caught it with an artificial grip. He quickly ended his words to the metal-tramp, pleased to be done with niceties. Joat snidely snickered. Bloth then turned back to look at the sight that made him celebrate.

"I don't like the sound of this." Ren stewed outloud, scarcely verbalizing his doom below a level volume. Niddler just exhaled, stalling little noises that sounded like muted squawks. Tula was breathless and silent. Ioz only glowered, he looked like he pined to shout out a scroll worth of obscenities.

The idleness continued as Bloth bore triumphantly down on his captives. He was reveling in his victory and deciding what his next move should be. The lengthy quietude followed further before Joat nasalized his sarcasm once more. "So what fun does Bloth want done with these filthy bilge-leeches?" He asked the Pirate Lord iniquitously, sly cruelty dripping from his tone.

"Wait, Bloth! Konk have important news!" Konk interrupted before Bloth could answer. The boor desisted, waddling up on his pegleg to the to pallor behemoth. "About Ren!" He added then, gaping wide-eyed up at the disfigured humanoid. Bloth viewed him in revile at having just impeded his glory.

Bloth growled and whipped around to scowl at the asinine pegleg. "What is it, Konk?!" The gluttonous captain nearly bashed the short man over with a roar, swinging in direction to the piglet. "This better be important." He seethed. Anger flashed in his singular amber, his gaze lingered and did not lift from the prince in the cage. Konk fleered contemptuously at Ren.

"Ay jitata." Sweat bated down from the trapped prince's face as he cursed one final time.


	6. Moonrise of the 13th

Chapter 5

MOONRISE OF THE 13TH

PART 1 - Dark Water's Greed

The sun receded quickly downward as an eerie silence fell over the floorboards of the Wraith. There were about fifteen pirates packed onto it's deck. Three forms stood with prominence over the captives imprisoned in a quadrate cage embedded over what did lead to the hold. The smaller of the figures conducted to speak.

"Ren is..." The peg-legged pirate veered up at a menacing anti-human, his boss. The word rolled on the tip of his fat tongue as he strove to let it go. "In...destructible!" His voice of gravel determined to groan out. Konk stared up at the brutal form with unsettled and spacious eyes as if he had truthfully come upon some impressive and horrifying revelation. From the cage four watched on fearfully, not professing a word.

"Don't waste my time, Konk." The nasty captain roared with warning, he plunked Konk up by the collar of the torn shirt and readied him to throw in annoyance. In the beginning, the Pirate Lord presumed this would be some spiel of incompetence about how Konk did something he would find to be unreasonable and would provide some paltry excuse for it. Instead, the irksome midget merely spewed dribble, but he wasn't in the mood to be audience.

"But Master! It not a lie! Konk hit Ren with weapon and Ren..." Konk despairingly rippled with a pause. "Unharmed!" His eyes transformed into wide gaping orbs, doting terrorstricken at his supervisor when making this shocking disclosure as if not fully believing it for himself. "Konk see it with own eyes!" The boor went over every fine detail, as if to validate. From the bone casket Tula gasped while Ren shuddered and swallowed a lump, he muttered a thousand curses in his mind for letting himself get hit.

Bloth narrowed his glower at the obnoxious munchkin of a subordinate and ceased as if to contemplate. "Is that so, Konk?" He glared in disbelief at the stout ignoramus who made the outrageous claim, but he inclined to deliberation. The tension on the deck mounted. "Even his skin?" His charmed voice shot through the dreary atmosphere at his target, and away from the cringing subjects of his notion. "Perhaps you would like to show me how?" Bloth laughed with peaking amusement. He leered at Ren, who tremored after hearing his mindful words. The crammed captives dithered from their imprisoning enclosure.

"Yes, yes Bloth. It all true! Me swear on twenty seas!" The pegleg nodded his head in compliance. He flapped his arms, painstakingly desperate to prove this idea as he would to honor his master.

The evil pirate exquisitely chuckled and quickly bat an eye at Ren, which made the boy's heart dreadfully skip. He turned back to Konk. "Then you better hope you're indestructible, because the next place you're going is into the maw of the Constrictus! You failed!" Bloth's emphatic cue shut him up. He angrily chucked the hoggish runt an accelerating distance into the frame of the schooner. Ren breathed a sign of relief, he was too pent up to take any humor out of the situation but he thanked Kuunda that Konk was the only witness. Unfortunately, they were out of one danger and into another. Bloth evidently had taken enough of smilge-tossing on the enemies' ship. "Take the prisoners!" The pretentious Captain roared as the minions gathered around to cart them off.

The sky gleamed of twilight as Ren's crew were tightly bound and backed against the hold of the drifting Maelstrom. Disturbing noises lingered from the pit to the back of them. The archnemesis looked on, admiring the Compass he enclosed in his hand. "It's finally mine." Over his hull of chipped skulls and bloody bones the Plundering-King boasted with a grin. His sneering at the four misfits mottled his infernal scheme as wickedness crossed his brow. He clinched the viridian Treasure under the opposing arm. Standing by his side was the mammal-headed troublemaker, intent on adding insult to injury.

"How do you feel now that you're finally getting justice, ship-snatchers!" The hooked-mutant waggled up close to fluster them as his and Bloth's men pressed the triad back. "I'm going to enjoy being able to sail My Wraith again! Steal My ship, will you? I'll show you!" Joat snickered amid a mud-slinging whinny, clicking his pincer at them. He was neighing with the rejoice of their misery, all the while stressing the true ownership of the fiery boat.

Ioz glowered but held his tongue. Tula seemed to be at a loss for words. Niddler whimpered nervously.

"Enough!" Bloth finally dictated. He circled his attention to his prey and walked in front of them, Joat backed up in a dignified reverence at his advance. Giving the three a dirty frown, he tottered over to the most unfortunate victim of his hatred. "I regret to inform you that your Wraith has no sail, you and your crew won't be going anywhere. Forget the first one, I am quite pleased, boy." Bloth teased the jolly inspection of his squirming opponent on the ground, who was splayed out by iron chains. Many a pirate howled.

"Then I don't suppose you'll be having a feast to celebrate." Ren internally lurched from his throat, attending to his qualm of not showing his fear. He needed more time, before what would happen next.

"You make a good suggestion, lad." Bloth almost was considering for a tender stroke of an instant before he resumed his barbarism. "Then again, I think I'd rather watch the Prince of Octopon Dagroned-and-Quartered. First." He chuckled as he stabbed a leer at the young captain's trunk and the separable limbs tied to each harness. Triple allies of the Questers gaped.

"Do me a favor, Son of Primus, and try to keep at least two hands on deck, I could use a better sword-hilt." Mantus's wisping breath stung at Ren in his mire, the cutthroat-crook unfolded his wrists from the insides of flowing sleeves to admire a prime cutlass and a rather large ditty of gold coin.

"15 Mantus! Says one goes in the pit! Yeah!" The cry from a lusting bandit blurted in with a sack of money.

"20! One in the pit, one off the bow!" Another lurker hooted, drooling at the heavy spoils clinched by Mantus's fist.

"We have to help him, Ioz! He'll have to endure worse than death, remember? What if it's everlasting?" Tula's speech was about to break, regrettably unable to break free from the killing looters patrolling the Constrictus pit. Her ecomancer's essence sopped for the pain her devoted confidant would have to undergo.

Ioz kicked at the heads but was suppressed by the impatient sea-men. "Even if he survives, I can't imagine what state he'll be in. If only we could think of a distraction...we're out of time." Ioz mourned for his lack of any clue, discouraged as his strength weakened.

"Bye, Ren. I can't bear to look!" Niddler closed his eyes the best he could despite both arms and wings being strangled with searing rope, he could only shed monkeybird tears and hope. He couldn't take the suspense, and creaked a green spot under his lid.

"You always knew how to make an entrance...and an exit." Bloth presided over his handiwork, Ren's subjugation more fulfilling than a ten-course dinner.

"Ay jitata, so this is my reward for saving the world?" Ren uttered morbid last words, he could not kick or even move all but his left foot, which was unlashed. His suffering only seemed to pleasure Bloth further.

"Now Mantus, show our prince real pain." Bloth puffed the sinister and intractable order to his league, a terrifying satisfaction about to rip from his inflated chin. Tula and Ioz cringed beside a now scrunch-eyed simian.

"Mak T-!" Mantus slung his blade to signal the launching. Three sets of boots bucked the ribs of the dagrons as Ren let out a premature scream of fright. Before the scales could divide into an airborne realm, a recall desisted the cruelty of the commander.

"Hold, men!" Bloth aborted the procedure with a parched-white palm. "Why do I only see three dagrons? Where is the forth?" He protested of the missing shackle on Ren's left.

"Sir! The dagrons need rest, these are the only available three!" Konk, who was overseeing the operation, waddled up to Bloth on a gimp stilt to bare the news.

"Well, that's not as fun!" Bloth complained sourly. The trio of smiles alit from the pit's ledge.

"So what do we do now, boss?" Strand sought new arrangement from atop his dagron. The two other pilots, the balding Vlor and a raider with a golden topknot, paid heed.

"Unchain him and tie him up with his friends!" Bloth dictated the setup callously, moreover he knew of another motive plaguing the wheels in his skull. The warriors submit him an Aye-Aye and followed their instructions. Ren was in not much of a better condition than before, but was still in one piece at least. The Captain paused to consider something. "This jewel is very significant." He clasped the large Treasure in one hand, focusing on Ren. "How did you acquire it, prince?" He reached out a blue claw to dig into Ren's shoulder, threatening him to speak.

"Like I would tell you, Bloth! Naja-dog!" Ren exhorted willfully, scowling indomitably at the death-staring adversary. Never would he put the Quest in danger of his own volition. Now he would need to propose a plan out of this, and he was trapped yet again. He could still see the lasting threshold surrounding the River-rune, but he could not know how it could possibly be used in his unfortunate situation.

"No quarter for this laddie! Eel-haul him and toss his wench overboard!" There was a stray cry coming from someone in the empire of cutthroats, Bloth transiently hearkened.

"I remember these two, I didn't have the chance to say Yo-ha-chakka to this one." Mantus paid heed to the sniffling sobs of the Quin sisters, who were bound and chained to the mizzen-mast. He swished his sword very close to Joiquiva's pinned hair above the garb, ogling her defiant pose in his steel tease.

Bloth composed an unstartled laugh. "I figured as much, Son of Primus." The abusive scoundrel imparted as he grasped the boy's shirt collar. "Perhaps I won't throw you to the Constrictus." He entertained a low delight, drawing his talons away from Ren. "Perhaps eel-hauling would be better suited for finishing you, instead. If you think you can survive being towed under the Maelstrom then you're as mistaken as you are ballast-headed, young prince. Yes, perhaps I'll let you meet your end in a watery grave. After I make you watch the end of your frien-" He yet again became bothered by an approaching pegleg who stood to get his attention. "What is it, Now, Konk?" He clamored in response to the aggravating grunt.

In the sky that was growing ever deeper with blue as the scarlet glow of the sun faded into abyss, a lone dagron-rider hovered unseen over the ship. "Now's my chance!" It's pilot avowed with a whisper that lost itself in the night.

"Sir!" Konk nervously started. "The Treasure glows when it's close to Ren!" The cowardly gantha-pig revealed to the fuming white-skinned giant, who was towering over him.

Bloth was about to chuck the stupid piglet into the pit, but the words found anchor in the revolting pirate's mind. He released Ren from his tight cinch, not far enough to swat him over. He pressed the Treasure out to the youthful venturer who struggled to squirm away and sure enough, it pulsated a brilliant emerald. "Ahhh." The charlatan's eye ignited with epiphany and consideration, he frowned. He whirled around to Konk and again hiked him by the apparel. "What was it you said about the Son of Primus?" He growled with severity to his mark, inquest hissing as he frantically shook him for a reply. Bloth had already forgotten the nonsensical thing the blubbering dock-pint rattled of earlier. Konk began to tattle but before he could edge out what he wanted to say, a solitary pilot flew down and hoisted him up. The lizard swooped up into the air and discarded him off the monstrosity, dropping him into the water. "What is this?!" Bloth blundered his phrase appallingly. "Torment my eyes, we're under attack!" He hollered, gawking above him at the incoming beast.

"Now!" Ioz yelled rampantly, seizing opportunity as the buccaneers were distracted. He kicked his way through to break free. Ren and Tula hurried after, absconding in the beeline of the Wraith. The dagron dove down then, threatening to pluck up the pirates on deck that were guarding the group. Niddler staggered about in the rope that bound his wings, shuffling for his shipmates.

"Why are they seaworthy?! I said Make Her Port Tack and Furl Her Mainsheet!" Joat snipped at the watchman of his crew as he witnessed the Wraith's sail still set.

"Duh, I thought you said Make Her Ready to Tack and Throw Three Sheets to the Wind, boss!" In counter the rolly-polly scalawag shrugged. Joat plowed his fleshy palm into his elongated face.

Joat stormed after them, also hightailing anent the Wraith. "You won't get My ship again! Kreld-eater!" He crossly scorned. Ioz hustled to get loose and hold the chrome-hooked slayer off with a sword, closely ducking to block the claw from squashing his face. The reptile again rustled down and scooped up Joat, ascending and sending him tumbling back down to the mantle, which he landed on with a painful thud. His claw clacked as he wailed, sore in anger.

"Release the dagrons! Take down that beast! Go after those dingamourds!" The Pirate Lord clattered as he pointed to the crew of the Wraith, who were now scattering toward the vessel to escape.

"Wait!" Ren shouted with insistence. "The Treasure! Bloth still has it!" He stinted as he stared at the repellent form of the warlike Captain from across the berm.

"I can't fly!" Niddler dramatically screeched, waddling around on clumsy feet with tethered wings. The strands promptly fell from a hairy and feathered body as Ioz drew his cutter back. He stretched elatedly and cawed, touching the sky and narrowly skipping an arrow. Tula, who had managed to untie herself, sliced at Ren's bonds with her knife and freed the leader of the group.

"I need to get the Treasure! Get Joiquiva and Lus-nayi! Go to the Wraith, I'll make my way there!" Ren drastically impacted his order, he glided his hands out as they became available. He speedily sidestepped an oncoming cast of thugs, scrunching to the knee and somersaulting out of the way. He struck with his own weapon from behind the man's in an agile maneuver, tripping him to the floor. He aimed for where Bloth settled, ready to fight. Twain rivals of fatal vie exchanged a mutual glare.

Tula ricocheted off an attacking sword from her cutlass. "We have to help Ren!" The sable beauty screamed as she tried to bust her way through.

"There's too many of them! Unfortunately we have to do what he says!" Ioz hollered abound as he dodged a clout. Pirates lined the leviathan-spined walls before him. Four crooks wielding weapons hied for Ioz, rushing for him in a single-file formation. He dashed to meet them head on, charging through in a furious sprint. When Ioz's blade took them out, he heard the sound of four consecutive splashes as the men hit the water below.

On slinking legs the eager second-in-command surrounded the twins for later plans. Joiquiva could not even lift a kick to fight the thin nails from testing the flex of her arm and that of her fragile sister, every moment their scared hearts beat was making his ominous evening. "You'll pay for this, Ioz!" Mantus swore his wrath in a stabbing snarl as he sickled his blade.

"No time!" Ioz grasped two shrieking ladies from their binds and heaved them over the shoulder as he moved. He snatched Tula's hand and they vaulted to the ship, ever involuntarily. Clusters of hooligans were blocking the rows behind them.

"I'll get you!" Joat resentfully forebode from the deck of the Maelstrom. He shook his fist with a burning temper as he tried to pick himself up but was quickly pummeled down by a dipping dagron.

Bloth seethed, he menacingly clipped out his sword at advancing Ren. His cold eye shot upon the brave boy who trailed forward with a puny half-steel. He hatefully raised his glaring metal, ready to make mincemeat out the valiant fighter who aspired for the Treasure. The beast from above lifted the protesting Bloth up and off the deck. The Treasure had rolled as the Compass dropped to the platform.

Ren initiated a dash for the Compass. He leapt and tripped, but he obtained the artifact and bound it around his neck. "Niddler!" He screamed to his friend who darted close behind.

"Got it!" Niddler screeched, flying in serpentine as the Treasure fled. The gigantic orb diverged and bowled down a troop of outlaws that were bobbling for it and Ren. It ran away down the deck until it had settled in a location against the mainmast and ceased to move. The monkeybird descended after it, flapping his wings, but became impinged by a sword.

From Ren's distant vantage, the motion of Niddler through the air was laggard. The monkeybird had almost possessed the bauble, which was far from him but he could see the slow wing beats in the breeze. He could also see the energy dome protecting the circumference of the orb. The Treasure was indeed causing a time lapse with whoever prolonged under it's shield. "Natchut! Niddler, get the Treasure! Now we must fight!" The royal torpedoed for the gem. The stray rube on the terrace slugged at him. Ren emerged from the ground and charged for the lowly man, in attempt to heave his weight to buffet the attacker over. With another slash, the grungy kniver had knocked him to the floor. "No!" Ren pushed himself forward to fight off the pirate and again became cornered. Terrified, he screamed out as he watched the scene of Joat barreling toward him with a hooked and angry claw.

"Ren!" Tula wailed from the otherside of the leviathan fossil. She tried to reach him, but her and Ioz were obstructed by the bloodthirsty cutthroats aching to have their heads.

Niddler divebombed Joat and grazed him in the face after scampering to the wind, he provided enough of a distraction to him and the troublemaker. He wasn't able to break long enough to claim the Treasure that had come to a stop. The delay encompassing the border of the Treasure was enough to dash through while the unprepared looters merely lumbered for the same locate and pelted each other down. Niddler snatched up the sphere with strong primate-toes, relocating the hindrance to Ren's space. Within the circle of the time-forcefield, Ren saw faraway enemies scattering quicker. He observed Tula and Ioz pouncing at heightened flurry for the Wraith. He attempted to use this to his advantage when Joat revived, but what he did not realize was that Joat's speed was relative to his and Niddler's when they were all inside the Treasure's zone. The fast-thinking lad slid by an alloy bludgeon, faced with the same formidable aggressor. On the floor he sank gravely as the degenerate charged. This time, he succeeded in tripping the maneuver. Niddler remounted in a gale to launch for the estranged jewel once again.

"Noy jitat!" The Captain uttered a curse he rarely vocalized. "By the blood of the twin moons! Let me go!" He growled with unending wrath at the invading pilot, he attempted to rip at the beast's leg but he had floundered his blade. With a detestable smile, he plied the auxiliary cutlass he carried with him and started to slash at the scaly skin. He prodded at the lizard's ankle but did not make much of a mark against the resistant hide. The dagron then released him back to the ship, making him fall a plentiful length below to the pier. He fell on Joat, who had been striving to move once more. "Throw a net on that jitatan monkeybird!" He exuded outrage as he screamed from his seat upon the stricken sea-mule.

Ren watched as Niddler was almost ensnared by a web on the return flight to the tethered Wraith, he rushed forward. He may only have one chance at this. "Bloth, over here!" Ren provoked the scowling warlord. Niddler was about to take a tumble. The Treasure slipped out of grasp and rolled toward the Captain's hungry vision.

"Noy borga!" Konk was swimming back to the Maelstrom when the reptile swooped over his head like a catapult shot. He dove under to duck in the water. There were more dagrons filling the sky, all from Bloth's craft. In hot pursuit, they chased the solo dagron.

Ioz and Tula jumped, climbing aboard the Wraith as Joat's vengeful crew stampeded. "Where's Ren? I can't see...Ay jitata! No! Ioz, let's go after him!" After a fazed hurtle, Tula silently rued the scene playing out, one she was helpless to prevent. Bloth achieved an absolute gain on the Treasure. She couldn't let go without doing something to help Ren, even if it meant using up too much of her vitality.

"Wait until he call us, Tula! I think he has something cooked up, and we have to hold off these sea-weasels until he gets here!" Ioz set his temerity on the ransackers at hand. He knew that while Ren was often a foolish and inexperienced prankster, he was also a silent genius in times such as this. "Come on, you eel-skinned barnacle-rats! I know you can't get enough of us and the fastest Fore-to-Aft in the Twenty Seas, she's yours if you can take 'her!" He teased the hardluck sailors of Joat, who were bearing down.

"It's mine! At last!" Bloth relished the prize hoisted in his uplifted clutches. "You fail, Ren!" He bellowed victoriously as he gladdened his sight above at the now dull Treasure, but the very thing his implacable heart craved to control.

Ren rapidly flew from the Pirate Lord and the Treasure on spry legs, as much as his soles were able to carry him. His destination was that outside barrier, two more steps that he needed to slam his feet to. He made it. "Ioz! Tula! It's a free for all! Ready, Niddler?" The ambitious regal made his announcement after grappling for the first projectile in vision, a catapult straw. He chucked the rod at the ox-bellied oaf. The wood pinged a lofty shoulder at an accelerated motion from outside the emerald dome of idleness, where time dragged endlessly. Though neither of them knew what he could see, he would signal the first throw at Bloth's penchant for pompousness. Niddler levitated a precise gap overhead.

"Now!" Ioz gave the call as Joat's minions poured onto the Wraith's floor. He clipped a knuckle on one bandit and with a snapping batter of a loose panel, annexed a dragonbow. He pierced the darts at Bloth on the Maelstrom from their sky-manacled craft, garnering velocity as Tula conjoined an ecomantic wind with the bolt. The barrage sprung like lightning at an advancement for the slowed Captain and the dividing dome. Three more shots fired and as the bully toppled stunted to the planking, Niddler scooped the sinking weight and dumped it into Ren's stumbling grasp. Ren caved the Treasure with protective arms as the monkeybird hiked off with him toward the Wraith. He soared his way toward the vessel aboard Niddler, who swerved as many nets and solid objects were tossed in his direction by violent prattle among the gruesome ship. Skirting close enough to the ground with the Treasure, the Maelstrom pirates could not boast any advantage while within the hoop of the time-forcefield. The prince slumped down just as Tula clung to the rope that escalated the Wraith above the water.

"Send out Grimrot." Bloth directed dire orders to a crony, who was only available under the high-moon.

"Kreld-eaters! I'll throw you to the Constrictus from here!" The shrewdly-annoying blister expelled from the deck behind Tula, threatening to toss her from her position.

"Not happening, tramp! Back to your own ship with you, scandalous-swine!" Ioz expelled as he swung down from a rope in an airborne-kick to bung Strand off the bulwark of the Wraith and back on to his home of the dingy Maelstrom, with a little push from Tula, as well as Ren and the monkeybird. The howl of the four-armed brute echoed, Ren slid to sever the cord the pest had used to skirmish up.

"Hold on to those sails!" Tula forewarned, she hastily severed the shackling rope and the Wraith plummeted an ample distance to the surrounding ocean. The only thing left to see as the ship plunged into the depths were Joat's blood-hungry men shouting and wringing their fists.

Ren took the wheel, rapidly leading away from the Maelstrom. "Who was helping us to get away, could it be?" He resolved, his darting pupils fixed on the dagron being hunting by the flock of Bloth's trained beasts. He gandered to the water jetting out behind them and with tribulation, saw that the structure of dark water had proceeded to form between the Wraith and the Maelstrom.

"Ren steer us out of here!" Ioz quickly ordered back, not liking the look of the creeping flow. Just then, the lonely dagron zoomed past them and Ren saw the pilot. Surely enough, it was a likeness.

"Ren!" The dame yelled to him from the skies. "Make for clear water, I'll keep them at bay!" Jazhea scaled the heights of the clouds, many airborne trackers following in her trail. "There's another thing!" She hurriedly cried out. "Bloth has something troubling! I saw something shining with him, but I don't-" Jazhea tried to forge with words before she had been engaged to veer with fright, a vocal train severed completely. Her shriek could be heard from remote.

"Has something shining?" Ren whispered with perturbed breath. "Jazhea wait!" He predicted from the wheel, being unable to do anything. He had been forced to steer away, but he needed to go back. He watched the dagron in the air rise up over the deck of the megalith, it spun in the center. It was then he saw it. He made out the form of another dagron-rider above him, brandishing an eel-prod. The gaunt and haggard face, the penetrating frosty eyes bore into him-he was chasing the potential sister of Octopon. He gave Ren a threatening sneer, it was Mantus! "Look out!" Ren screamed to her, but it already was too late.

"Mak Toi!" The abrading command sounded from far off. Ren heard an ear-shattering woman's cry.

The plagued lizard wrapped with suffocating nets and wilted to the floor of the huge ship. "No!" Ren belted as he felt internal anguish engulfing him. "Noy jit..." He could not finish his uttered curse, succumbing halfway. Eyes of ocean-disc descended as he steered the Wraith en route of bright waters.

"Ay jitata! Ren, what was that?" Tula sympathetically hurried out. She ran to Ren in concern for her melancholy companion.

"Let me introduce myself, I am rotten to the bone!" The tide surfed over the bow and dispensed a skinless skeleton to greet the voyage with an insidious crackle. With his disintegrating innards, a pungent wasteland stained the very carious pierage he walked.

"He's rotting the Wraith-get him off!" Ioz charged for a section where the foul mildew was breaking off plank from the vessel as it decomposed to wretched wood.

"Hey, that's mine!" Niddler rumpled his feathers when he fumed above the wind. Fruit festered and spoiled black, the disgusting stench from the searing juice could be inhaled by great Kuunda above.

"Think if that minga-melon were you, monkeybird!" Ioz bristled by with a shooing defiance of timber and blade thrown down on the leeching decay, Niddler gulped on one final stare at the rotten food.

"Grimrot!" Tula purged a gasp from her dismay. "He's a Fugisapien, he'll turn to dust in the sun but unfortunately it's nighttime!" She bounced backwards long as her legs would allow. The resourceful enchantress lobbed aside a metal fishing-hook to fend off the danger, it rusted and severed to pieces as Grimrot's spore festered over.

"It is useless to resist, all that my deconstructed body contacts dies and decays! Should I mummify you...or just pulverize your core and let my maggots cut your meat off the rack?" The shrieking cackle from the elongated jaw of dripping carapace peeling from the skull paused the crew in their tracks. Everything Grimrot touched curdled like a liquid disease, his glowing bones raised and launched a finger into the helm. The dart crumbled half the wheel to dry powder.

"Can't we...talk this over? I know an old friend of mine you might like to live with...and a ship you may want to go back to!" Niddler crawled in horrific anticipation as the monster's breath hung painfully close. The natty claws were trickling over Ren and smothering Tula. Ioz recoiled at the cretin's mercy, glare of the dim evening's sun was by chance strewn across his sword and deflected on the macabre dybbuk like a dewdrop beaming of daybreak.

"Not light! You win this time, but when I return I will clean your carcasses!" Grimrot panicked at the hint of heat and sprung among the ocean, swimming from reach. Ren sighed as the Quest's heart beat easy once more.

"I couldn't save her..." Ren solemnly regret. He peered down with grief, eyes downcast. "Jazhea." He softly respired. "She may have been the only link to my family left, but Bloth has her now." He spun back with sorrow to view the thick slime, which now converged in more and greater sections of sea to the rear of the Wraith. The Maelstrom began to drive out in the opposite direction of the rise in the black impurity.

"Ay chunga, Ren!" Ioz scoured at the sea behind him, tugging on a rope and correcting the jib. He finished up to pace to his rueful friend and even with his rough-and-tumble spirit, he felt strong sympathy for the prince. "I'm sorry, Ren. By Kuunda, I swear we'll avenge her." In mourning, he rested his arm over the saddened boy's shoulders. Ren wasn't responsive and deeply unsettled. "Next time we fight Bloth we'll hit him extra hard, I promise buddy." Ioz tried to lift the youth's spirits. The rugged seafarer's aggressive manner of dealing with his losses wasn't all that consoling but Ren's mood now sufficed, intense and focused as well as pained.

"We did do all we could, Ren, but it was her sacrifice. We could have been in real danger if it hadn't been for her." Tula joined on, words somber. She felt as if what she said began to spur Ren out of his state. Ren was an energetic friend who cared deeply for those afflicted by trouble, but sometimes he needed a word of kindness himself. The growing leader could find himself in a catastrophe sooner than a baby goija would run from a leviathan, but she always found herself confiding and believing in him.

Ren grasped his Compass with ambition as it flashed aglow. It pointed in the direction they were headed, North. "We'll follow the Compass and find the 10th Treasure. There's no stopping now. We have to go onward, we'll stop Bloth and all his evil." Ren emphasized his oath at last, both solemn and adamant. "We'll end this plague of the dark water for good." He craned his neck behind him for the sealing detestation on the surface of the ocean, he lipped the words of the one element entirely at fault for all destruction.

Throughout the darkened nights abound, the Wraith sailed to frontiers far yonder. Land began to creep onto the horizon as two glorious quarter-lit moons hung overhead. Something appeared like jetsam, surfacing from the water's crest.

"It won't be far, now." Tula whispered empathetically, she eyed through a looking-glass and spotted something. She dropped the piece down from her view. "I sense something strange about this land." She advised the two sailors on the ship, glancing at them as she expressed her intuition. They had almost breezed in to shore.

"Ioz, why did you save us from those other pirate-men?" Joiquiva faintly objected with a mutter as she sprawled by Lus-nayi's drowsy chest, baggy eyes over gauzy cheeks did not hide her disgust and distrust.

"I need a way to stomach my food, don't I?" Ioz bent over the wheel to set the siblings straight. The light of the moon and daughter of joy glared at the impatient helmsman then rolled back to a sleep, this one free of nightmares.

"You're right, Tula. You know I haven't seen any dark water this way at all. I wonder if it's because of the Treasure, we know now it's taking longer to arrive because it slows any ship carrying-" Ren had been about to scull the Wraith onto the beach when he whirled his head in a split-second toward a loud and piercing noise. It sounded like a scream. "Ioz, take the wheel!" The startled aristocrat immediately urged. He rushed to portside, seeing the source of the racket. Someone was drowning! He hastily dove into the tide off the partition of the Wraith.

"Noy jitat, what now." Ioz expressed in a profusely-tired gripe, unhesitatingly spinning the wheel apace as Tula yanked a quick fix to a rope. "We'll have to go after him." He took the bow close to the shoreline, following Ren's bobbing form in the waves. Niddler fluttered down to the survey railing as Ren swam forward to face another entity in the water.

"I think someone else is out there!" Niddler cawed from portside as he saw Ren, who now pulled the singular figure and paddled in expectation of the coastline. He flapped his feathers as he was anxious to fly but he held back, waiting for a sign.

Ren paddled as he carried the life in his arm, pushing for the shore through the turbulent current. It seemed as if he would loose his embrace, even on the raiment his arms were starting to tire, but he managed to make it just far enough. He didn't procure the opportunity to peek at who he saved, although he could tell the frame was small and not cumbrous for him to carry. He broke down on the sandbar with the other person, coughing to squeeze the water out of his throat. He swam and refrained in shallow water, resting presently. His friends were anchored about land and racing to him. He felt Ioz's strong arm pull him up. "You're okay, now." Ren maintained as he coughed out, beside the individual. He loosened his catch on the sparse person's waist. He gave the stranger a glimpse of surprise. Ren's eyes adjusted on a child.

The unescorted youth bowed his head, not saying a word. Tula leaned over to get a good study of him, she placed a hand on his head. "Can you speak?" The ecomancer guardedly tried to ask him. In a dissected moment, more lifeforms came from out of the bordering edge of the night. Before the four voyagers could react, they were surrounded. Spears pointed at their throats. "Chungo lungo." Tula squelched out, taken aback as much as the rest of her assortment. The chieftain in the meridian of the group of shadowy characters clumped forward and began to exhibit the arriving mishap.

"What brings you here, travelers?" The profile, now in front, stepped out from the circumference of the legion. She appeared to be an old woman. Her presence showed flowing hair of silver that reached her knees and was tied in an obscure topknot. She stood tall and frail, bearing a ruddy flush. She seemed something like Avagon, but her eyes were ingrained with a rooted orange. She featured much like the other people who were gathered around her, all of them wore a seemingly-sturdy armor of silver-violet. She passed her gaze to Ren, inviting him to speak.

Ren was surprised the woman spoke in a dialect he could understand, as she was so diverse, but he bowed his head. "I am Ren, Son of Primus, Prince of Octopon. I come in peace. We are here on a Quest to seek the Thirteen Treasures of Rule to save Octopon and Merr from the dark water. We would be honored if you pardon our intrusion." To be familiarized he obediently found his rationale, kneeling before the ancient gatekeeper.

"I know who you are, Son of Primus. Who are the ones with you?" With cynicism the chief mistress inquired further, almost brushing the prince away as if he were trivial. The pikes were taken away as the loyal team assumed more dignified poses.

"Oh!" Ren reacted in a manner of difference. He was caught off-guard by the woman's interest in his friends, unexpected for those who called him by his title. "These are my friends and fellow shiphands." He stood and gave his crew the honors. He held out his arm to Ioz, starting himself out. "This is Ioz, he's our chief-navigator." Then he beckoned to Tula, who was next to him. "This is Tula, she helps us with trimming and dynamics." Niddler plodded near, who he finally motioned to. "And this is Niddler, monkeybird." He finished his address of cordiality, smiling and docile. Niddler let out a squawk.

"Ren's monkeybird manager." Niddler corrected and tagged on to Ren's introductory with a dignified air. "Pleased to meet you." He shyly welcomed, retreating from his mock superiority.

"This is Lus-nayi and Joiquiva, they're the newest additions to our crew and they've been helping us with sail-repair." Ren decisively included the chary twins as they entwined in a diffident snuggle of each other.

"...And fine cuisine!" Niddler savored the gourmet remembrance of taste when he smacked his insatiable beak. The orphans shrunk in their porcelin faces because the main ingredient was air.

"It's an honor." Tula sincerely greeted the lady of the clan, beaming and nodding her head respectfully.

"I could have introduced myself, Ren." Ioz prematurely muttered, eyes shifting toward the bronze regent with irritation creeping into his respite.

"Silence!" The chancellor of the mysterious people demanded. "I asked for the Son of Primus to speak, not you!" She castigated the three.

"Oh isn't this nice. Jitatan rudderless-old-woman. Just peachy." Ioz impolitely grumbled. He was sunken of breath as he supposed no one could hear, but Ren did and was then inspired to shoot a warning stare at him.

"We would like to speak with your chief-navigator. Please provide us with all your charts and maps, a history of your plotted routes." When the authority enacted her directives, every number of man and woman bearing lances and knives subdued the circle to cooperate.

"What about the aerial division, instead? I'll offer my expert flying-advice...it's very exclusive-but you could pay me with a sample from the local menu?" Niddler stammered with spastic dread, posturing as if he were a daimond-tail.

"By my sword, line up and I'll show you how I shorten that status-list down to size." The ambulatory lineage broached as Ioz shouldered his sword from the hilt, prepared to fight it over. Ren resolved to just do it. "Fine, we're Northwest by North 333.7 points off-course our destination in Octopon, 87 leagues latitude and 26 leagues longitude of the Kalindasean ocean. Our nautical status is beached, like a sand-mule. What's it to you?" The ragtag pessimist bungled with a scrolled parchment stretched between his fingers. Ioz revealed the many transcribed chases-at-sea as he also dropped the stellar ephemeris and the ocean log.

"What is it you plan to do with this information?" Tula begged to learn.

"Come this way. Your captain is indeed Primus's Son." The plated overseer was ultimately assured.

"You needed all this...just to-!" Ioz sputtered at this audacity, sacking sand-caked articles among a ditty-bag.

"I have heard many things of you, Ren. Your own father once visited our shores many moons ago, you are noble like he was. You have saved this child as I have seen." The terra scour of her ancestral glory explicated while speaking to Ren with less hostility than she did to his friends. "How were you able to do this?" Her bemused analysis was fluent as she raised a brow.

"Your greatness, I saw him in the water from the ship. I hurried to save him. He was drowning!" Ren courageously professed. He bowed to the superior with humility, and addressed her with respect.

"Ah, I see." The tribal leader remarked as she curved her eyes and pondered this fact for a moment. "Because of your noble act, this boy's contribution...will be yours." The foreign guide finished with diction. Ren goggled up at her curiously. The other villagers with her let out gasps and shouts of stupefaction, they strayed to each other in gossip.

"Contribution?" The arched prince wondered, eyeballing her with puzzlement.

"We are the inhabitants of this sandbar, the ancient and wise Leviathan Worshipers. We live in harmony with the leviathans that rule the seas. We protect and rule this northern land using our vast knowledge of the dark water." The overseer of many years sternly began to explain. "You may have noticed this land bares a protective barrier against the dark water. This is due to our wise youth, the Imbibers who keep it at bay." Her words ended midway, allowing the flaxen-haired regality a response.

"Imbibers? Ren, I've heard of these people before! They drink dark water! Isn't that right? I thought they were just a legend..." Tula spelled her perplexed fright in awe, imploring the versed lady to verify. Ren bolted his companion a muddled glance, not having known of this before now.

The structured woman seemed annoyed or staggered at her interruption, but she answered the ecomancer anyway. "That is correct, girl. Certain children of our tribe choose to learn to control the dark water from youth. However, what many do not know is that this skill grants them extensive and powerful knowledge. They can see things on Merr that would take many years to learn by human efforts, if at all. This is the protective power that we need to keep this land safe. You see, as a people who live near the nests and caves of vanquished leviathans, we have access to the gifts these creatures bring us. Scale of the Leviathan. When contained with the dark water and consumed, it gives the Imbibers protection against the plague, and the ability to shield our village. Needless to say, this power may be only harnessed for a very short time." The silver-haired matriarch construed, an edge in her mien.

"Are you sure? I've never heard of something like that before. I only know of one time when someone tried to drink dark water, and it didn't end well for them." Tula inconspicuously asserted her doubts, not liking the ping of pure pain that was washing over her.

The chieftess beckoned to a shore behind her as she paced toward it. It exposed the filling of petrified statues, endless and likened to humans. "These are the monuments of the Imbibers that have sacrificed themselves to save us. Once the dark water has overtaken them, they become as rocks...in suspended animation." The tribe-head described with doleful accuracy, she fixed her scour to the many stone figures upon the seascape.

"I didn't know such a thing were possible..." Tula halted an unescaped gasp as she adversely deflected in the direction of the elder's attention, her mouth ajar. Niddler leaked a barely audible whine of a squawk.

"By the two moons..." Ioz shuddered out, nearly shouting with an uproarious apprehension. "That's a curse from the Eight Wonders of Fezwa!" His credulous vision deceived him, he trembled.

Ren's eyes grew vast, restlessly horrified. "Why do you let them do this? Tell me, there must be a way to free them?" Ren searched the conductor with unease. It reminded him of Cray, she tried to drink the dark water to restore her youth...not without the awful consequences of melting her away from the inside.

"There is no way to free them that we know. There is only the legend that states when the dark water is vanished from Merr, they will move again. The unfortunate gift is only granted to those young enough. We do not let them do this, Imbibers volunteer themselves to protect the land they love, to delay the flow of the dark water. To take the role of an Imbiber is a great honor here, one very much strove for. It is a mark left on Merr for all to see...my Only's name was Zuuyha." The gray harbinger finished as she gazed at a prominent fixture of the rows, his height high as her mere stomach. She drew off her trawl, leaving the prince and his journeyers to take it all in.

"Wait, I have an idea! What about the Treasure, Ioz come here-" Ren began to concoct a plan, signaling to the columns of the unliving. Ioz instantly nodded with wide eyes and pitched forward, the thought was curtailed.

"It's useless, I'm afraid. Having encountered King Primus himself when he was on his Quest, he too tried to free them with every gem he had obtained byfar. To no avail, our Brave Ones await. We know nothing of why the powers of the Treasures ceased to have an impact, but we would appreciate any attempt to salvage this world." The chieftess stopped the notion in it's tracks, diverging away. "We will help you, Ren. The boy you saved is an Imbiber, but since you have come, he will impart you knowledge in your Quest instead of protecting us. Ask him any question and he will give you answer." She stated, peering at the boy next to Ren, who had been standing with the crowd of his people.

"How can you, how can you do this? You're going about it all wrong, what kind of ruler saves their own and then has them drink dark water..." Ren droned under a woe of morbidity, he almost did not want to believe what he heard. He did not know what to do, this whole situation was wrong. He didn't understand how these people could swallow that horrendous evil with an attempt to stop it, volunteering or not. It made no sense to him and he wanted to scream. No matter what he decided, someone would suffer. "No, I can't allow someone else to sacrifice himself for my Quest! I refuse to think that the dark water can do any good at all! I've seen first hand what it's done..." Ren fumed as his eyes darkened, he would have reached a fury if he hadn't been interrupted.

"Ren." The lad by the noble's standing dropped to a bow and began to whisper to him. "This is my charge to take. I already have the dark water within me. Tell me what it is you want to know and I will give you what you seek. Your Quest is the most important." The child advised Ren, watching the facial twist above him. In his eyes were pools that resembled black waves.

Ren stilled at a loss. Indeed there were so many questions he wanted to know the answer to. He wanted to know about his father, his mother and his family. He wanted to know about the other Treasures and the dark water, but he couldn't. "I can't." In dim frustration the prince indicated.

"Ask him, Ren. Otherwise it is in vain." The ancient leader urged with the persuading ultimatum, she somberly watched on. Many other youthful inhabitants were clustered around, motivating Ren with wishing eyes.

The youngster did not wait for an answer. He tried to touch Ren on the arm but he let out a yelp as his fizzing skin started to boil inside when it made contact with the prince. "You have a Treasure of Rule within you, but it's not complete. I can't...contact because of the dark water residing in me." His voids of dark met Ren's pure, he appeared to be straining or struggling to consummate his words. "Do not abandon the Compass of Rule, it is too part of a Treasure you will yet find but you will need to break the Seal. Do not abandon your father's sword. The next Treasure will not be easy to obtain and you will find it deeper in on this land. Return to where your father fell. You are safe now from your enemies, but you won't be. Do Not Abandon the Truth, even to them. There will come a time when it will be your only weapon. I'm betraying The Dark Dweller...it will...Beware of The Surge!" His sight became wild and he fought more and forcibly against an enemy Ren could not see, then his body started to solidify. In less than a dispel, the Dark Water overtook him and he was transformed into a calloused stone of the blackness depths.

"Ugh!" Ren jerked back after the tiny villager was encased as rock, alarmed and frightened. Despite the fact the outburst had scared him, he remembered every word. Though, he likely would not want to.

"Soosa, you have honored us, brave one. I hope that your words will help to stop this destruction of our great planet." The dignitary witnessed and dropped meekly to the perpetual boy. Her gestures were hard to read, but she was austere.

"What did he mean by deeper in on this land?" Ren inquired of the tribal woman, still quite thrown into a shock by the event.

"I imagine that can be taken literally, Ren. He was communicating with the dark water however, so his words may have been quick-set. Unfortunately, we have no clue as to the precise whereabouts of the Treasures." The head warrior advised, opening fortified orange-eyes as she browsed above. She pulled herself up from her bow and stood to address the youthful adventurer. "We can help you voyage to the center of the land. I have a sense Central is what Soosa was speaking of." She motioned to her defenders, who nodded with obedience. "However, it is strongly suggested that you rest here for a night. The journey to the heart of our district is a long one." She stated with a durable gesture of hospitality. Ren pondered the quandary.

"Is the Wraith secure, Ioz?" Ren spun around to ask his senior shipman.

"Is she secure? Of course she's steady. I tied her right over there! I even laid down salt to keep the bilge-slugs away..." The cranky Ioz flustered as if Ren insinuated his pirate's integrity, he pointed to the location the dusky craft had been tethered. Ren shot a glance to the direction of his sign.

"Right. We'll stay here then, and set out in the morning." Ren revolved to the foreign leader with an affirmative nod, he accepted. "Treasure or no Treasure, we're going to do something about this." He declared, a certain kind of determination coursing through words. "You are welcome to come with us, Joiquiva and Lus-nayi, but you know we do seek the Treasures of Rule above all else. If we do find the Guyfoo Capsule, it will be secondary." Ren invited the duo, a double-set of arms long as legs guarded their shallow chests. The feathered bobbles of their hair twitched but they did not like what he said and departed with the women of the Leviathan Worshipers.

"Follow." The ancient attendant mildly ordered the young man and his shipmates. "This is our central stone. This orange leviathan skull is covered with a magical enchantment which protects us from outsider attack." When the tribal mother led through a passage of nappy trees and religious sacraments, she stopped Ren in front of a peculiar bone-obelisk.

"How strange, I don't remember ever seeing an orange leviathan." The disparaging prince stood uneasy when his mouth was halted from dismantling his bizarre message of bewilderment with Soosa's nagging warning. In her foresight, he stopped himself from touching the liquid-coated keystone.

"They are exclusive to our shores. Very rare, but they are a blessing from Kuunda above." The chieftess praised the pedestal with admiration as she strut to perform an introductory ceremony inside the ring of keepers. "Ren...if you would, there may be possibly one small favor your crew can do for us...there is a flying spirit stealing food from our village. Arrows rain from his teeth and he disappears before any can see his face, and we would be most grateful if you could find any fault on him. His name is...Nimbo." Then when she raised her bone scepter, coral eyes sought the lad's attention. Ren jolted.

PART 2 - The Number Five Emotions

Two moons shone brilliant over a dismal villa. Out of a scaleplate-covered hut, a caroming silhouette joined two more. The trio scooted for the seaside.

"Ren, we really need to get some sleep. I know the old woman's sandbar is a charm to be around, but we still have a Treasure to find first thing in the morning, remember? I don't think Kyanna would appreciate us snooping around her graveyard. They're been here for seventeen years, I don't imagine why they would move now." The burlier one related, slowly moving as his arms bulged from the hiking shadow. He shivered when the starlight air blew, though it was warm.

"Ioz, we're not leaving until we do everything we can to redeem the Imbibers. We can't just walk away from helping them. It won't take long to try. After that, we'll rest and see Kyanna and her people tomorrow." The gentler of the bundle tipped-toed through paths of leaves, whispering as stars twinkled and faintly illuminated obscure parts of the point. Ever since his run-in with the child, Soosa, he had noticed the time-forcefield surrounding the 9th Treasure of Rule had vanished with the delay. Whatever Soosa had done, he was positive the encounter was teeming with dark water in the very presence. However, what he did not understand was why Soosa statically converted to stone and did not meet a demise by the liquefied obsidian that consumed him.

"Longer than seventeen years, actually. I think Ioz just doesn't want to carry around our token of gratitude anymore, in which case, I'll take it off his hands." Tula offered to relieve the pirate of the stifling emerald. The aura from this area of Merr was drowning her effectiveness for a long as the Wraith's crew had arrived. She nor Ren and Ioz seemed to be in the best of temperaments.

"It's too late for that, woman. I'm fine! Don't think I can handle myself?" Ioz grudgingly replied, a bit insensitive while lugging the not-very-portable Treasure.

"Suit yourself." Tula puffed her casual opinion. "Ren, I haven't ever seen a village like this before. Leviathans are all over, so I wonder why Kyanna stays here. Teron would have stayed among Andorus's dying groves, but he was of the Supreme Ecomancers." She puzzled outloud, surmising her former-mentor's judgment was exact. They stomped forward through ridging jungle-brush, at last merging with the high shore. It was then when they were stopped.

"Perhaps I can answer that question for you, wayfarers." The aberrant sound rung of an unexpected source. This was a male voice. The party lashed to face the intrusion. Amazingly, it did not match the form that appeared in the ebb of ambiguity.

"Salamantha?!" The companions stumbled, but generally ready for battle. In purview could be seen a icon of auburn and brimming robes of the destructive ecowitch. Parallel stood a comparable clone, in front of the two strangers was a twiggy man of about Ren's age. Nearing the ground squirmed an odd deformity, which could not be lucidly perceived.

"I'm afraid not. I do know a great deal about ecomancers though. First let's lower our weapons and talk like smart men, Son of Primus." Salamantha's voice changed into that of the previous fellow. When the effeminate character stepped forward it was revealed that his tresses were not claret but actually a rosy blond, and his skin was fair. Tula and Ren subverted their stance. "Very good. My name is Iskjar. I was formerly one of the aides of your father, King Primus. When I knew you were here, myself and our people desired to meet you. By the way, Ioz, we must offer our sincerest gratitude for the salt you planted on our brush. Those purple bilge-leeches can be very nasty. Please tell us if there is anything we may do in your honor." He fervently approached in a wrapping cape of sage, ushering a hand to the two accomplices.

"Just tell us who they are." Ioz reversed with iffy heels, will dabbled with interest.

"This is my dual-brother, Kyn. My grandson, Xilk. My partner would be here with us as well, but she happens to be out for our tribe's festivity preparations, so forgive her absence." He gracefully inducted, crowding his kin to the light. "As for your question, the Clan of Leviathan believe there is something here. Should they leave, the world may fall into ruin. Occasionally, there is a pulsing from sands underneath their villages...an enigmatic substance that courses from seas up North and reverses all of their afflictions. This is their Holy Land, if you will. Not of the dark wat-" Iskjar imposed on with profuse detail, Ren anxiously jut in.

"Whoa, now hold on!" Ren imbued a shorter fuse than his natural acumen, seemingly madder than most had seen him, in reveal of the dark water's ruin. He inwardly clutched for his gallantry. "You were of my Father's counsel, the Seven Captains? Kyanna of this village said there was nothing that could be done to help the Imbibers at all." He asserted his concept while watching the fluke encounter of three with care.

"Right. Pardon me, your Highness. Unfortunately, she is right. Most of these monuments have been here for the time your friend described, and longer. Our people would not know how much is true. You see, we have only migrated here from our original home. The Kree do not like to leave our place of birth, but in recent years our true home has become cursed. We have settled here but we do not commune with the Leviathan Worshipers, we majorly remain in our own tribes. If they have offered you assistance, you would be wise to take it. The Treasure is somewhere here, I can't say I remember where. It has been such a long time since my difficult escape from the Fogweed of Aymara, and my hiding of the 5th Treasure given out by your father." Iskjar unluckily disclosed, he then hefted a zany mutant that refused to settle. "There, there." He nurtured the riotous thing.

"That must mean some of the Treasures we've found so far were already hidden, Ren." Tula focused on the prince and admitted. Ren spoke of what Avagon had told him. Iskjar was soundly another one of Primus's Seven Fleet-Captains who hid the corresponding Treasures of Rule during the time Avagon and the King were taken by Bloth in the Aymara seas. "Iskjar, did you know of a Treasure on Arakna?" She sprucely wondered, then digressed. "Think about this, Ren. Maybe what we found there can help them." She suggested with a flashing hint. Ren nodded.

"Iskjar, we believe we may have found a solution. We visited Arakna island previously and uncovered a mystical River there, we believe it's a Treasure..." Ren summarized his tentative concern. "It made me invulnerable after I claimed it." He cautiously proceeded. Iskjar drew a brow.

"Is that so? Are you certain what you have come upon was a Treasure of Rule and not a Leviathan's nest? The people here believe in the perdurable capabilities of a Leviathan's scale." Iskjar refuted, an unprolonged detail crossed his assurance. Ren sought Ioz's approving sign. The thrill-seeker nodded.

"We're sure. Perhaps you'll tell us more?" Ioz became hasty at the new lack of points in the foreigner's fable, his gruff implication nudged for response.

"Yes, Iskjar. Avagon told us we would find out more when we journeyed up North." Tula readily appended, courteously searching for likewise.

"Avagon escaped from Nloth? This is news to me. Was Teron also rescued?" Iskjar's stunned perplexity showed within his azure gaze.

"Nloth will capture our homes and give our people to his pirates! Like last time, grandfather Iskjar?" The younger native, Xilk, called out from behind the greeting leader.

"Nloth? You must mean Bloth, Captain of the Maelstrom?" Ren decided on Iskjar's misspeak in a guess.

"I rescued my mentor, Teron, from Bloth...sometime after he had hidden one of the Treasures. I only wish he knew more about what happened to Andorus when the ecomancers began to disappear, he told me weeks had passed since Andorus was plagued...but really it was thirteen years." The Andorian beauty hampered her dolor, her mourning was full within her nature for all that became of her own island's people.

"Correct. Our tribe calls him Nloth and no, he won't, Xilk...Not this time." Iskjar chided his excited grandson. "You won't find much up North, only the remains of our home. Despite our island being ravaged by enemy forces, we remained there far longer than we should have. We harmoniously shared the same isle of the wealthy Quin nation." He offered with an agreeable grin. "Oh, ecomancer!" Iskjar called Tula forward, his incisors dazzled with his summon. "I noticed you do not rely on Andorian soil, you have drawn the powers of the Viva Tree within yourself?" He apprised with a pervading awe. "What is your name?" He asked.

"It's Tula. I've only been inside the Viva Tree once, but I discovered my ecomantic capabilities by accident. Wait, how did you know?" The sable-haired lass marveled.

"I know, because while ecomancers live many years on Andorian soil, there is none here available. I can't imagine you would have the capacity to carry an entire bed of your native ground this far inland by your scant packings as well. I don't suppose anyone has told you how our race evolved?" The cream-toned visitor awaited an exchange with the nature-binder.

"Well, no." Tula reflectively replied, she did not often think about where her people came from when the life-giving Viva Tree had given the Andorians all that was needed.

"Everything is born from either the Viva Tree or the Spirit of Merr, blessed by Kuunda. Both are the roots of our world, from eons ago. Our legend states that the Kree are descended from the ecomancers, who are evolved from the Viva Tree. Lesser tribes like the Quin from the nation of Qui-Qua became as a people when our race intermingled with Water-Dragons and such as this, all is entwined with the four true Elements of Merr. The natives of this land believe leviathans are children of the Spirit of Merr, like some believe the city of Octopon was originally born from as well. The element of Kuunda's sea and the Healing, the natural wonders of Ecomancy are also derived from the original Mother and Father forces. The Moonsail Festival that many Octopian men and women celebrate is a time of rejoice, a tribute to the merging of elements." Iskjar humbly relayed, he lowered the staff he hauled. The eccentric lifeform in his cradling grasp then rested once more.

"I know about the origins of the Moonsail Festival, but I didn't know those from other isles believed too." Ren respired, in line with the general unforeseen ambiance of the conversation.

"What I say is the fundamentally-accredited tale. There are some who believe forms of life may have evolved from the dark water as well, though I would not buy in to much of these rumors. The same men and women who believe in the dark water also believe in the missing element, a source of trouble for many a follower of Kuunda for eras." The speaking Kree outlined boldly. Ren stewed.

"Prince of Octopon." The youngest of the abroad troupe bowed and requested a gesture of good grace. "Please, take this. I'm not sure what good it will do you, but you will have better for it than in my possession." Xilk displayed to Ren a small orange-jeweled ring as he yielded his hand. "It will only remind me of something I wanted to happen." He expressed a cloud of remorse. The moonlight flashed off the whipped shape of his platinum-blond coiffure, his mane was crested not unlike a bird's headpiece.

Ren scanned the cloudy gem. It was not a Treasure, rather he perused it with a repellent vibe and did not wish to touch it. "I'm sorry, I think you should keep it." Ren averted the distinctive item but Xilk already began to comply and drew it away.

"Xilk, you would do well to bury your memories." Iskjar serenely recommended whereas Xilk did not grant any strong regard. He turned back to Tula. "I am no ecomancer, Tula, but I am familiar with the workings of this world. I can give you a few spiritual-pointers if you wish to become more powerful in your influence of nature, like you will need to in the Quest you have embarked on. True, is it?" It was Tula Iskjar stalled with eloquence, he watched for an opinion.

"Of course." Tula acknowledged him right away. "But I only use my talents for the good of everyone else." She provided after.

"A great purpose, and exactly what I wish to show you." When the former aide finished he lifted the uncommon creation, one that now whimpered of distress. "Tula, if you wish to have endurance, first learn control. When you can defend yourself and curb the inclination to loose yourself, you will be victorious." The knowledgeable elder decidedly assumed. He pressed the creature to Tula. "She is called a Baurabor. They are automatically attuned with nature and thus with ecomancers. She will reveal your destiny." He presented the daring sorceress with the pet, which she timidly accepted.

"By the sea lords, I've never seen anything like her before. Such a cute one she is at that! How can she help me?" Tula laughed as she cuddled the likeness of a puppy spirit. From the head and paws it sprouted tufts like treetops. The tail was comprised of one extensive vine.

"Baurabors are not from the Eastern Octopian region, though they thrive just as well. They're certainly not as rare as a memorat of course, but they are a cave travail to find. Often only leaders of villages carry them." Iskjar denoted with a smile. The hound whinnied and kissed the ecomancer's cheek. "She surely feels a bond with you, that magical bond will unfold your journey." He concurred with the emotive feeler.

"I can see why, Tula has an alluring affection. The magic she compels is wonderful." Xilk optimistically praised, seeming also very charmed by the sanguine enchantress. The sprightly newcomer beamed.

"She sure is popular tonight, I'd guess being able to move flowers is all it takes for a woman to get supporters." The raven-toned pirate huffed, shuffling uncomfortably.

"At least I can move them, Ioz. I don't spend all my time bickering like a kreld-scudding darva-rat." Tula sorely sighed. "He isn't always like this, but he's been a real grotto-brain lately." Tula apologized for her cohand's manners.

"Like a denbar sea-slug, woman! We're still out here passing time with wasteful niceties while we could be resting for tomorrow. I don't believe in magic." Ioz rattled off with a raucous zephyr, shunning away with the burden still in arms.

"You don't like his words, do you?" Iskjar instantaneously sensed.

"Is it that obvious?" Tula reluctantly hushed, blushing with embarrassment and cementing her glare away from the unkind swashbuckler-bandit.

"Well, you would not be a stranger on many parts of Merr." Iskjar wisely empathized. "Regrettably, the festivities in our own community will be taking place during the moons' zenith. We must bid you farewell-" He was about to make his departure, Xilk instead came forward.

"Grandfather, there are things I would like to teach Tula about our land, and I may learn as well. If you say so, it would be an opportunity to show Ren and Tula our culture's generosity. May I please go with them?" Xilk unexpectedly sprung in, at the boggle of both the crew and the citizens.

"Why Xilk? You know you have your studies to partake of..." Iskjar deliberated silently. "I suppose it will be fine, so long as it is with the Son of Primus of course." He necessitated his meaning.

"It's fine with me, Tula?" Ren granted his reserved approval, motioning to the partner at the side.

"We'd be honored." Tula acceded with a shimmering smile. Perhaps she may learn something new, and maybe be able to pull Ioz out of his mood. Though, she wouldn't count on it.

"Then you will meet them at dawn before they embark, but when they do, don't impose." Iskjar blessed the apprentice with a positive eye. "Kyn will go with you, also." He laid down the rule. Xilk seemed very upbeat. "Unfortunately this is the last time I will be seeing you, for my leadership is needed elsewhere. Remember my words, Tula. May you succeed in your Quest Ren, for all our sake's." Iskjar signaled in allegiance, along with the assemblage of his family. They too delighted and wished regards before tracing away on a contrary avenue.

"We wish well to you, Iskjar! May your people have Kuunda's blessing and protection." Ren hollered back. Overall, he was pleased Iskjar's jargon was understandable. Ioz continued to grumble, once more provoking the assertive empath into verbal barrage. "Knock it off, we don't have time for petty things like this!" The imperial sailor forewarned.

"Says the one who dragged us out here in the middle of the night. At least you should have gotten Niddler up from sleeping off all that fruit." Ioz mumbled, he stomped wearily onward with Ren and Tula as the moons advanced to high sky. Only a glimmer of a green stone could be seen and crooning of a tiny scamp listened to.

PART 3 - Discovery

Tula recollected the events of the night, she quietly poked back into her allotted den after departing from Ren and Ioz. Her new companion seemed spastic still, despite it being so late. "What's wrong girl? What are you trying to say?" The ecomancer curiously attempted to tap from the bouncing familiar. Finally, she laid down for bed. Baurabor settled soon after her easement. No sooner had Tula begun to rest had she heard a startling calamity outside. She jolted up and hastened out of her room.

Outside of the rainforest erected a courtyard, one with enclosed walls all around. Ren was holding his ground against a monster of an opponent, a recognizable glutton. Tula suddenly was fixed in place, watching a battle taking place over inland dark water.

"Yes, say your dying words, Son of Primus. It looks like you have helped me whether you wanted to or not, inane boy." The heartless pirate captain smiled as he put away the newly-reconstructed Treasure of Rule. "Say goodbye, Ren!" He brandished his carving edge, planning to lance Ren into the conquering water of silence underfoot.

"I'll do the honors!" Mantus lashed a blade for Ren with an eradicating roar.

Ren surprised himself by jostling his nemesis to let him go, but he was still abandoned. Backing torturous dark water with two enemies surrounding him. No Treasure and no weapon had he holstered. Finished. Closing his eyes, he braced himself for the final blow and the end, not wanting to look. Mantus's scimitar flew at him, severing the air as he managed a drop down. The insectoid duelist hopped away and out of sight.

With a ginormous ripple of the Pirate Lord's sweeping blade, Ren was forced to skip. The unarmed royal receded a gradually-accelerating distance at Bloth's advance. "Ren!" The gracing sound rung from the muddy sky. The prince bestowed a gander up and spied brilliant feathers, a blazing weapon dropped right near him from above.

"Noy jitat!" Bloth cursed.

"I'll have your back next time, Ioz! By Daven's beard I swear!" Ren called back through constricted breath to the sky. Tripping a killing sway of the adverse cutlass, Ren grasped the glowing Sword of Primus and secured it in his trembling hands.

"We'll see about that." Bloth angrily growled. He charged forward with the steel razor, aiming to slaughter.

When Bloth attacked, Ren was not thrown back by his swing. The Sword Of Primus could have added to his strength superbly, as Bloth could slash at Ren but was unable to knock the young man over or bash the weapon out of his hands. Even more raw dynamism was behind Ren's sweep than that of Ioz's fully-armed blow. At long last, the mortal enemies were equally matched. "Give up the Treasure now, Bloth! Surrender and we'll finish this!" Ren screamed out a warcry as the rivals locked blades, circling each other like korba-cats in a fight. The breeze filled with the clatter of the burning flecks from the dueling match. Ren flipped about to the fringe of the destructive Captain's periphery, commencing to almost nail a perfect disarmament with a shock from sidelong.

"If you can take it from me!" Bloth roared out, bounding for Ren's throat. The battle that would be a fight to the death escalated as Bloth muscled Ren toward the dismal stream, perspiring with another shove. The unimpeachable foes impounded in a perfect stalemate, until Ren gained the upper-hand. The shove expelled from far beyond. Bloth was off balance from his standing, with a claw vised around the young man's ankle. Tula found herself able to move, only to see both Bloth, and Ren, sinking in dark water. The apostate stalked forward, facing Tula while barring the Treasure of Rule within a quad-fingered palm.

"Nothing awaits us here except the stark abyss of the Dark Water, woman. Cooperate, or I'll make you join Ren in his agony. With this Sword, these hands now wield the skill of a true King." Mantus stomped out of the carnage, the abusive blademaster demanded the ecomancer fall to her knees with an incise that promised a bloodcurdling death to any opposition. His greasy mane licked the obscene wind in pursuit when she tried to run, tinges of blue barred her pink guise.

Tula found herself expending the last of her energy to rend herself from the rancid claws. Ren had lost his life, and so had Bloth. She imagined she secured a glimpse of Ioz and Niddler debarking on the ground before fading away into oblivion at the total exhaustion of her essence. The glimpse of a moderate-bowed ship in waters beyond and an unsightly beast floated down. Her vision set on, but omit a glowing statue and then a spirit with hair of rose. The scandalizing defrauder twisted around with a venin glower, becoming as no more when Kerroptus and Morpho reached the boundary of dirt. The face of the Dark Dweller arose, liquefying over Ioz and Mantus. Tula could no longer sense any more screams when her light flickered out.

The first heat from a soft ray was felt in a hutch comprised entirely of bone and indomitable hide. The peaceful gust rushed over black locks, from an outside source. Tula's sore eyes creaked, she found herself calling for her missing friend. The window of the leviathan-donned lodging was ajar and Baurabor was nowhere to be seen.

The very next morning Ren congregated with Ioz and Niddler, walking down the seaside.

"Tula should be here soon. It's peculiar that she's running behind, she seemed as enthused about this meeting as you are, Xilk." Ren faithfully reassured the boy of same age.

"It's ok, Ren. I can wait, but if she doesn't show up I can write her some notes to look over later. I know you've taken time out to see us, it would be wrong not to repay you with something." Xilk mildly provided compensation. His frontage shone with a twinge of disappointment.

"Notes? What is this, flight-school? I don't believe I dragged myself away from a mountain of gold at the break of dawn for this." Ioz fussed from a cross-legged station on the ground, gurgling from a canteen. He threw in his last drabul into the game circle and retched a hand of dice, but even his dreams were not as valuable as real coin.

"Be patient, Ioz. She'll be here." The determined essence did not leave Ren's purpose.

"Chance bids pay two-to-one. No second bets, better luck next time." Ioz fairly walked away with both of the salaries from Joiquiva and Lus-nayi they had earned from assisting the waitresses at Zoolie's gamehouse. Luckily for the gambling swashbuckler, Ren and Tula weren't involved to castigate him as usual for it. Ioz searched their wreckage with his greedy pupils. He didn't reconsider at their disappointed faces but he remembered Joiquiva and Lus-nayi's home was invaded. Lus-nayi had been attacked and broken, by the very pirate-cheat he was not like. "Well...I could always sell that tiara. Put it in and we'll play all or nothing, for keeps?" Pointing at Joiquiva's headband he offered the gold he had won from both orphans for another game and during his replay he made a careless mistake which cost him everything, even the last drizzle of coldness from his heart.

"You cheated to lose, didn't you? Rematch." The shy woman of Qui-Qua refused to be dishonest, Joiquiva pressed the gold toward the real victor. Ioz was a foreigner from a different isle, a pirate at that. Yet, he wasn't like the pirates Joiquiva and Lus-nayi knew.

"Pass that fake gold off on me, eh? Try it on the landlubbing monkeybird." Ioz blustered as he shrugged off but quaintly ended the bargain with Joiquiva and her older twin, who sat in silence. Joiquiva bit a piece, and almost broke her molars.

"If you need guidance, Ren, perhaps your company would like a look at the Divining Fruit. It won't make predictions for you, but it may grant you a perspective. It is very fickle with replies but I think it will work on you." Kyn generously offered a bizarre rind with a moving face to the reluctant nobleman. Niddler pattered to the front, hearing about fruit.

"Can I eat it?" Niddler poked the talking gourd, waiting for permission. With gusto he beak-smacked greedily, hoping the chow wouldn't be tart.

"If it's edible, that means you can eat it." Suddenly, the face on the husk inverted itself and showed a pool of water that said a result.

"What if it's not?" Niddler pawed the round with a peeking eye and a skeptical criticism.

"Then you can't." The Divining Fruit replied.

"How come?" Niddler groped the waterface, whining sadly.

"Niddler, don't play with it." Ren sighed as he dragged the eager monkeybird away. "Sorry, Kyn." He apologetically handed back the squash to the elder Kree.

"It's quite alright." Kyn casually pardoned the happenstance.

"Sorry I'm late!" The hasty cry rejuvenated the gathering. Tula raced down the nearby turf, arriving with disordered breath. "I'm ready to begin!" She stressed with an open optimism. "Oh and...you left this last night." She offered to Kyn an apparently-magical weapon.

"Oh, this is grandfather Iskjar's Soul Scythe. Thank you, I'll return it to him." Kyn bowed his head gratefully though his words were shaking with predicament.

"What's wrong, Xilk?" Tula was befuddled by the puzzling stare she was being given.

"Nothing! You look, different...from when I saw you last night, but it must be the light." Xilk shyly mouthed as he observed his guest, pasted on his cheeks was a blush.

"Oh! I didn't know what kind of training I would be doing, so I took some provisions." Tula motioned to the makeshift tote she carried that was comprised of her waistsash, she had tied it in a mismatched shape from what she usually wore.

"Concentrate, Xilk." Kyn cautioned.

"Right. First, I need everyone to back up." Xilk revolved to situate himself in front of the trio. He then lifted a scythe in his palms to the high wind and twice spiraled around. "By the Trust of Myelkah and Toishuok, the Lifeblood of the North, I wield your vitality to earn the Love of your Creation!" In an exploding tempest, he conjured a luxurious burst of water through the air. The glorious blue expanded like a disc over the heads of the awing spectators, and widely into the forest.

"Noy jitat! What are you trying to do, get us killed?! Why you..." Ioz hollered after bristling into a flustered clash with the tutoring lad.

"He probably intends to teach me what he just showed us." Tula begged to differ.

"Actually, no. Unfortunately, you can't learn this. Since we're drawing on the power of the Protectors of the North to perform this magic, it can only be taught to those who have blood from our isle." Xilk shrewdly corrected. "That wasn't what I wanted to show you, this is." He raised his sickle with a profession of steel. Inside the jungle could be heard a soft tapping and a loud clobbering, the noises were looming nearer until both could be seen. The pair of winged cats bounded out of the bracken. The first was giant but demure in scale to the second, which seemed to be a doubled, if not a tripled duplicate of the original. "These magnificent beasts are called korba-cats, and today we're going to be learning to ride one of these creatures." He grinned with a smug announcement as he patted the larger of the duo on the mane of showy onyx.

"You're going to teach us with the child, right?" Ioz rebounded as he threw out his arms, utterly petrified and set on running far away.

"Which one is the child?!" Ren shocked into a numbed stun, immensely terrified.

"Are you serious, Ren?! The one that distinctly Doesn't look like it could carry us along with Bloth and his main men into town!" Ioz retorted with an emphasized comeback. The felines sat on their haunches.

"I imagine they like monkeybirds...a little too much!" Niddler gulped as his green pupils shrunk. He fluttered to Tula's ankles.

"Yes, Xilk, please tell us. Will we be piloting the mother or the child?" Tula was jittery, but mostly suppressed her nerve. She was not as frightened as the men were.

"The child?" Xilk genuinely laughed. "Nothing of the like, that's her mate, and we will not be riding her today. As a matter of fact, only male korba-cats are used for transport, they are more energetic travelmates. Kyn?" Xilk stroked the beasts of lion likeness, seeking his assistant. The female's mouth jarred to let loose a ferocious roar, revealing her abdomen-length tusks as she found herself blockaded with a hooped energy-cage from Kyn's summon. "I'll take you all one at a time, and...Tula goes first!" The radiant-haired practitioner decided as he invited the ecomancer to come forward. Ioz scoured. Ren cheered. Tula shrugged.

"Hmph, well that's just as well. If he messes up on the woman then we'll have the better go." The harsh buccaneer sulked. Ioz crossed his arms, drumming his fingers and leading his mindfulness to other daydreams.

"Give it what you've got, Tula!" Ren applauded from the sandy floor. Tula complimented with a smile and a wave before launching into aerial frontiers on the fringed feline.

"It's nice to finally have your formal company, Tula, I can't tell you how impressed I was when I found out you don't need Andorian soil to subsist on, you're so much different than any other ecomancer I've seen." Xilk praised his passenger, seeming very much to be enjoying himself. Tula gave him a distracted glimpse, and he cleared his throat. "Anyway, riding a korba-cat. This is probably a lot easier for you, since you are an ecomancer after all. Korba-cats are one of the gentlest creatures on Merr, though they are fearless and will fight to the death when angered, they are shy creatures who will flee if mistreated. Encouraging them to fly involves establishing trust, when you are able to do so it is easy to direct them wherever you wish to go. Here, have a go." He passed Tula the reigns and she skirted around a treetop, easily clipping past any resistance the current of the wind was giving her. "So tell me, did Baurabor help you?" While he conversed easily, he wondered what kind of vision the augur could have given her.

"Well actually, she ran away." Tula unwillingly confided.

"Yes, that often happens." Xilk motionlessly acquainted in his worry. "Try going higher, I can't show you everything while we're here but if you go farther West from around that ample stone, you can see part of our village." He inspired her to drive on, so she cruised with continual speed over the blotched jungle. Tula soared above the skyline, where the dusky and natural beauty of the region could be noticed, shielded by impenetrable trees. Verging on the locate of constructed hammock-hutches, she could watch the curls of watery life flooding into the cascading fountains. She spotted a few of the residents waving to her. Journeying deeper into the domain, the ecomancer could see the beginning of a river loop, downstream appeared to trace to a murkier contour. Twisted formations and thorny sedge arose from the rooted heel.

"Xilk, what is that part of your village called?" Tula signed with an outstretched arm to the uncanny plain underneath the midnight feathers. Spawning quietly away from the trail of Xilk's wispy hair was a mountaintop of morning-infused ivory.

"That?" Xilk pondered as he gandered toward the terrain of Tula's point. "We don't call that anything. It's not in our dominion, or Kyanna's." He truthfully assessed, not at all forming any kind of recognition. "We should go back now, if you want me to give your friends lessons before you have to go." He pleasingly reminded his study of their limited time. Tula agreed and swirled the animal away from a difficult draft to land on the flat bank.

"You're next, Ren." Tula transferred her turn to the nearest man as she disembarked. Ren nodded and joined Xilk at the mount for a somewhat-lacking exercise. Tula caved to a closeby tree to break for a snack, innermost musings unfortunately returning.

"Some cultures have customs that aren't broken even in the event of danger or death. The Kree for example, we stay by our people in the event of a disaster. For instance, if a fire takes one of our own, we do not flee until it is put out, and in the event it is not extinguished, we all stay where we are." Kyn educated neighboring Ioz and Niddler as Ren skated through the clouds.

"Why? Doesn't it make more sense to save some even if you can't save all?" Niddler fantastically denounced the ancestor's logic.

"Why should the rest of us run if one of us wasn't able to?" Kyn debated astutely.

"Sounds like a good plan to go extinct to me." Ioz flatly disagreed.

"Actually, it makes perfect sense to us. Since we always build our homes near some source of water and there is always one skilled wielder of the gods, there is no reason to evacuate from our land or our sisters and brothers. It's much easier to excuse mistakes if you know your life is not on the line. By the way, no Kree native has ever died from a fire." With a savvy expression, Kyn followed his words. "I don't think Iskjar has told you this, but this is how he obtained his leadership after Primus's era. Another overseer from our people, the gifted diviner called Sheelia of the Supreme Kree, because she was born with a doubled spirit was also one of Primus's Seven Captains and trusted aides. When she fled from the wreckage of the King's Quest she had sparsely obtained any time to flee before Bloth was upon both her and Iskjar. Iskjar, instead of running, stayed by her side. So that he could flee and guide our village, Sheelia gave all her life to him in a last request of the Five gods we Kree call a Soul Song, only her's was even more powerful, a Devotion Song. In the process Sheelia rusted her life but Iskjar then was the recipient of twice as many Soul Storms and he would be able to use the new blessing to create his escape in the defeat of Bloth's men." Ioz ceased his argument and Niddler pad to the front to welcome the descending captain of their ship.

"Your turn." Ren buffed Ioz on the shoulder as he sing-songed past.

"I'll go this time, Xilk." Kyn courteously took over to reassign Xilk. Xilk was plastered with a grin as he set off for Tula's ground.

"So, Tula, do you know about what makes our grounds legendary besides korba-cats?" Xilk gamboled to the sinewy trunk Tula was slumped against, showing his perky virtuosity. His endeavor shook her head. "I hope the answer you were thinking of was Jeega-reeds!" He presented Tula with a clean swamp-reed blooming of pink Octo-petals.

Tula plucked one of the flowers and smelled it. "It's like a dew-field." The young enchantress appraised the familiar and heavenly aroma.

"They grow on Andorus and all around the twenty seas but more so at our old home before the dark water took it over, not to be confused with the white Saqtie-Stars that put you to sleep. They're supposed to enhance our inclination to acquire things, but that's just a sailor's tale. They just look nice when we use them for the Dance of Lumora during the Last Equinox." Xilk sat beside the lady of his time and recounted with inspiration.

"Dance? Lumora?" Tula pried an inquisitive query at her animated friend, who was chatting away without a daub of inhibition.

"Our ceremony of dancing and sharing gifts when the sun is at peak declination. Here, I'll show you." Xilk reached a gossamer clasp onto the ecomancer and pulled her up, he then spun once and hopped. He swayed, and clapped. He skipped for two steps and swayed again, touching a stem to the side of one heel, then the one on the other foot. "Try it!" With a entertaining felicity he energized his guest.

"I think I have this well enough, it's not perfect but we have a Quest to return to. Kyanna won't wait long and Ren and Tula-Noy jitat!" Ioz almost flipped off of a korba-cat when he settled to shore with Kyn. The four of them were moving their hooves, monkeybird included. "We're wasting time with bilge-blasted dancing?! We have to go to Kyanna! Niddler, you should have been watching the Treasure! Ay jitata!" He immediately scolded as soon as he touched the soil.

"You know you can join us, Ioz!" Tula laughed as she swung her hips and straggled her arms, thoroughly delighting in the hiatus.

"Never! This is all your fault!" Ioz was more hassled than before when he snapped accusingly at Xilk. He drew his eyes away from Tula and tried to regain himself. "Let's go!" He gruffly demanded. Tula giggled at his maroon cheeks.

"Oh come on, Ioz, where's your sense of adventure?" Ren sportively heckled the vilifying swashbuckler. He turned to Tula. "We should really be going now, Kyanna won't wait until the next moonrise. Let's go get him." In another moment he ceased his actions and began to trail ahead, Tula chased him in sequence.

"Hey, I was just getting the hang of it!" Niddler groaned as he tripped over his clunky feet and plopped down on his rump, the stem of the Octo-petal he cradled floating to arrange on his crown.

"I still have respect for my Favorite, Ioz. You can drown your despair." With an irritated whisper, Xilk glowered as he crossed the sightline of the rough Tayhojian. He flashed the fiery gemstone riveted to the Rite-ring on the smooth opposite of his hand.

"Why do you think your sea-flora is of any concern to me? Drop anchor with the woman over the brush for all I care, Tula only slows us down." With a wrinkle of his swarthy lids Ioz snorted as he resumed his uninterested patrol of the convenient sundial. He was very mesmerized by the trickling of drips from the central spring, moreso than any preoccupations with the greed of his vast-monetary wishes.

"Right, and I like that fountain too." Xilk assumed his outlook of dry humor and gathered with the others catching up.

"We wish you well, Ren. If you're ever in need of help, we'd be delighted to see you again!" Kyn bowed ceremoniously as he saw the explorers to their separation. The sun was levitating over the crux of the horizon.

"Bye, Tula! Write me if you can!" Displaying his own goodbye, Xilk enthusiastically parted with the waving allurer.

The cluster trudged through snaking aisles outside habitation until meeting their awaited appointment. They followed the tribe until they came to a spacious and broad-reaching canyon, where a mass of water floated.

"Ay Shakka leviathan! Ay lookka leviathan! Leviathans of nature, befriend! Leviathans of sea, ascend! A song of days, we spend night's head in your rhythm until time descends! On your bounty of excess we depend, so defend us all in our beds so we send your praises to eras born yet again! Emerge from the bend, else our song never ends!" The prime devotee trumpeted this repeating mantra until the bordering atmosphere of brush was alive with complaints. She created a noise from her hands, she yelled from her throat. Out of the water, a leviathan came.

"Noy jitat!" Ioz vigorously blurted. The quartet jumped, ignited in the instant.

"Be calm. She won't hurt you, so long as you are wearing this." Kyanna of the Leviathan-worshiping people and three beside her handed them all solid robes that resembled the gear the natives wore. Mighty and protective, like that of a leviathan. Strong, but heavy. Solely by the direction of the elderly chieftain, they filed up to mount the gargantuan beast with Ren holding the Treasure. The scales were troublesomely large and difficult to maintain upon, Ren nearly slipped and dove off the girth of the majestic creature. They settled as the serpent remained still. "Are you ready to go?" The Leader of the leviathan-believers steadily asked.

"Yes." Ren nodded in agreement, finding fortitude.

"Splendid." Kyanna uttered a special word and before the crew knew what had happened, they rocketed off. Up and down through the water they went like a fireball launched through the air. They pressed to barely hang on, hauling excited curses until the gigantic water-queen stopped at the apex of a wide stretch of land. Evidently, they were in the middle of a lush forest with untold foliage and rivers. The four heedfully alighted, with Ren taking the lead.

"I guess we're here." Ren casually slid off the leviathan's back as he swaggered, attempting to get his footing on the hard ground, which became demanding. He sheltered the Compass in his hand and it pointed into the forest. "We got here quick enough." Ren shakily estimated, still jittery from the trip. He tried to orient himself with the land.

"We almost arrived here in twenty pieces too." The candid Ioz remarked. The leviathan bawled and sniffed, then it looped around and plowed through the water of the canal as fast as it had come. "Great. Now how are we supposed to get back?" He fussed and arched a gander at it soaring away. "We have to lug this jitatan pain around." He tiredly griped, he now supported the 9th Treasure in his arms.

"We won't worry about that right now, we have to go to the next Treasure." Ren followed up as he unwrapped the protective robe, leaving it near the ravine. "There's no reason to carry this." He plainly stated, the others adopted his lead.

Niddler troubled with removing his gown. When he finally unstuck it, it adhered on his head and caused him to topple over on his flank. "Hey, wait for me!" The monkeybird cawed out finally, after having dismantled the garment. He rushed to the adventurers, who were now making headway into the jungle.

"It's up this way!" Ren anticipated the next test. He suspended the Compass in his hand as it flicked back and forth and hummed, honing in on something. The crew tracked it up to a clearing, in the way lay a cliff too profound to cross. "Looks like we'll have to find another way around." He reported with disappointment. He bore eyes at the deep crevice that almost perished below.

Tula smiled as she latched her hands to her forehead and drew her concentration. "No need for that when I can help." Tula whispered, focusing her energy as a bevy of trees from both sides of the cliff twisted to form a bridge over the great ravine, branches entwining. The party nimbly passed and wobbled to the otherside. Tula began to hypothesize about something. "Ren, what do you think Soosa meant when he said Do Not Abandon the Truth?" She consulted her companion, having a bad feeling about some idea. She worried if it had meant for Ren to tell someone about his abilities, but that didn't make any sense.

"I don't know, Tula. The whole thing is not something I want to think about. Those people drink dark water in an attempt to stop it, but they really have no control at all. I vow on my father's blood I'll help every last one of the Imbibers." Ren focused on moving ahead, his tense expression abode. He tried not to think about what had happened, but he did not have a choice. His head would not let him. Ever since the event his mood had soured, he could not let go of the conception of those who continued to expend their lives to delay the dark water.

"That's true. Supposedly, he was communicating with the dark water. Ay jitata, we can't know if it's real or not." The ecomantress answered back in response, muddling over her introspection on the Imbiber's intrigue. She did not say it, but she knew it to be true. She sensed the worst kind of evil before the boy immersed in stone.

"I don't suppose I can speculate, since I've been left out of the Ecomantic-Occult-Circle." Ioz shaped his doubts, legging over a ridge of gravel.

"Ay chungo, what a way to start an expedition." Tula dolefully sighed, not giving in to dissension. "Ioz, you should be grateful you are." She sagaciously reassured the temperamental swab.

"I am too, apparently." Niddler squawked in congruency. "Hey, wait for me!" He cawed as he sufficed to scurry ahead. The allies marched for deeper Central.

"We just have to keep on. I know we'll find a way to help them." The prince strongly persevered before his miffed comrades, not wanting to drawl on the perfectly-cemented words that were still spinning in his head. He nearly tripped as he dodged a clunking vine on the ground that started to shift from underneath his feet. "Noy jitat!" He vented a frustrated swear, slashing at some of the brush with his blade.

"Whatever the case, I don't think I'd want to visit there again if I had the chance." Ioz groused his opinion on the situation with a huff as he leapt over a bulging root that scattered in the way, he almost buckled from his posture. "Ancient and wise...drinking dark water is not very wise to me! Never heard any less convincing bilge in all the twenty seas. Chungo lungo!" The pirate grumbled as he straggled again with the Treasure, he tottered way through the rough floor of the tropical forest.

"Look! Straight ahead!" Ren spiritedly cried out, pointing at something forward of the company. Tula and Ioz ran to his aid. Niddler fluttered in front to see.

"This is where the Compass points? Another water-jewel?" The monkeybird questioned with puzzlement. He gawked at the pool of water awaiting them. It seemed to emit an unfamiliar luminosity, but different from the river previously encountered. Only the water lay in wait. It flowed purely, except for a roomy plank of wood drifting at it's center.

"No, Niddler, I think there's something else here." Ren's soft-spoken inquisitiveness murmured, he hurdled to the water's edge with enthrallment and hopped aboard the plank.

"Ren, where are you going? Wait up!" Niddler yammered, flying onto the plank and trailing the master. Tula was next to go after him, she did not mean to hit the water but she did and braved a slide as she landed. Ioz careered through the spring, revealing nothing special about it.

"Where's the jitatan glow coming from?" Ioz expressed in wonder as he searched around in the water that partially submerged him.

"Maybe from another Treasure, let's try to find it and we'll find out." Tula keenly returned. Ioz floated her a look of annoyance.

"Ioz, put the Treasure on the drift and keep it afloat, it will be easier. Everyone, help me paddle." Ren initiated the motion, tripping into the water. He clamped onto the backside of the timber and fluently kicked out with his feet. Tula and Ioz followed, splashing in after him and grabbing a moor on to the frame. Niddler sat on the plank, laying his head back.

"Bout time someone paid some respect!" The primate-bird squawked smugly in his laziness and rolled over as if trying to sunbathe.

"Cut it out, Niddler." The unamused regent flatly replied.

"This is a team effort, Niddler." Tula teased in a sing-song voice, she smartly grinned at the slothful monkeybird.

"No chance, monkeybird, time for you to pull your own weight!" The black-haired helmsman dictated, albeit coarsely. He dragged the avian in by the tail, and with a plop into the river as he started to paddle. He was not going to pull the mooching tagalong around. He posed the Treasure atop the platform and contained it with a burly arm. Niddler protested with a disturbed chatter about the sudden thrust into the liquid, which he hated, but he gave in and helped the others to shove the broad lumber.

"It's still pointing in the direction of the water." Ren curiously observed, handling the Compass with one holder on the board. The loyal comrades continued to coast for suffuse time, the inlet became swamping and dank. Leviathan bones littered the path of the riverbank.

"Chunga lunga, this place is beginning to look like the Maelstrom." Tula noticed from scanning all around her, in concern of the scattered markers.

"It shouldn't be that much farther." The young noble quickly predicted, but he forcibly jerked away before he could elaborate further. "Ahhh!" He screamed out as the river abruptly cascaded to an end, a waterfall threatened to crash them and swallow the Treasure. Outcries from four deckhands were drown out by the rushing water as they dropped into blackness below. The river started to gray over now, and lead into a cove of trees. The shipmates grew out from the water, thoroughly soaked.

"Let's hope we find it before I drop this thing." Yearned a water-washed and overworked Ioz, who barely enabled to stone-grip the orb at a dive before the fall.

"My feathers are wet!" Niddler complained with a yowl. He pursed his feathers in attempt to free the cloaking saturation.

Tula spiraled in view of the surroundings. The ground remained unlit, save for a few ivory-hued and leafy vines tipping out. Upon landing the mysterious brilliance shimmered all around the spot. The encasing fog was murky, the disc of the sun merely peaking like a sliver of paper in the sky. "This Treasure must be powerful. The glow leads into that cavern of trees and it extends even farther than that!" The toned ecomancer observed, continuously amazed.

"I think you're right, Tula." Ren agreed as he pivoted to face his friend. He bound the the Compass up to his eyeline and it pointed straight to the nest of bramble ahead of them. The area glowed eerily, but the innards were totally black. Leviathan bones protected the archway. "I guess we'll go in." Ren nonchalantly proposed, walking under the tuft of trees. The ecomancer and bandit tailed with the monkeybird, padding close behind.

From the mouth of the thorned branches that twisted under an opening, strange noises sounded. Ren and Tula surmised they could hear disturbing gurgles coming from underneath the ground they trampled. The dirt floor below was nestled with vines and radiated an enigmatic golden-white. The tap of water droplets were distant from the tips of the canopy, which now had become visible no longer. Thick tenebrosity swallowed them and shielded the vista as the group strolled farther in from the fringe of daylight. Faded remains hugged the walls and dipped down from the lofty ceiling.

"Chuno lungo!" Ioz propelled angrily as he slammed into a curled bone hanging down in front of him that his sight obscured.

"Watch out. It looks like they're everywhere." Ren was serene in inflection when he signaled to Ioz and tapped him on the shoulder.

"How long until we can find this jitatan Treasure and get out of here?" The onyx-haired buccaneer hotly grumbled.

The floor began to move from beneath them. Abducting vines sprouted up from the ground and folded around hands and feet, restraining the four adventurers. The strange sensation felt slimy, something between a plant and the grip of a sea animal. The party lifted into shroud so dark they could not see themselves. Trying to fidget away, they found they could not, the appendages gripped to them like an octopus grasping a prey. Nothing showed to be clear except for the strange and glittering pureness below their feet. Faintly could they speak or hear each other.

"Does that answer your question, Ioz?" Tula echoed across the plane, but almost did not carry loud enough to able to reach the other mens' ears. Niddler spawned an inaudible squawk and said something else, but with his monkeybird accent could not be surely understood. "Noy jitat!" She gasped but as her voice ricocheted, it sounded only above a whisper.

"Who seeks the Treasure that lies in this realm?" Shook a booming summon like the possession of a living snake invading the chamber. Deeply startled and frightened, answers were menially surprised noises from the trapped team who could not see this nonphysical watcher. The monkeybird only let out a cry much like a whimper. Silence stayed in the covered heavens.

"I am Ren, Son of Primus, Prince of Octopon. I seek the Treasure! Whoever you are, please direct your quarrel with me!" Ren nobly shouted throughout the hollow emptiness. Noises that rung like protests from Tula and Ioz flooded in the opacity.

"Ahh. I know of you, valiant Son. I am not here to quarrel. I am the Guardian of the Treasure that lies in this dome. This entire chamber is under my rule. All that is in, I may bend to my will!" The voice of the Guardian told. Only brimming breaths could have been heard within the dome, but all became idle.

Ren tumbled his mind for a pause. He was suspended in the air with only the cold and slimy cords holding him up. He could not see at all, much less where the prominence came from. "Please allow me to speak! I seek the Thirteen Treasures of Rule to save Octopon and Merr from the dark water! My Quest is of the gravest importance! I need the Treasure you guard here, if it is a Treasure of Rule!" He shouted out as loud as he could project to make sure the Guardian, and his companions, who were also hidden somewhere within the limits, could hear him.

The stall of wit sat again, and then the preserver picked up. "Son of Primus, you need not shout, I can hear your words. There is a Treasure with you already, I can feel it. Part of another, is it? I can read the Treasure and know it's desires. Your test here will be a personal one. You seek the Treasure in this realm, and I will allow you to have it. However, only one person in your group may claim the Treasure. If they fail, there will not be a second chance. This chamber will be sealed off forever, with you and your company inside." The thundering one slithered anew. It paused. "You seek the Treasure, and you were the first to answer my call. The choice is yours to decide. I have spoken the arrangement." The Guardian concluded his rules. The chamber fell quiet.

Ren analyzed this briefly. Where was the Treasure? He couldn't see it, and the Compass was unresponsive. It would be so much easier if he could be free from the vines to claim it for himself. He created a long delay of air as he lost himself in his own mind to deliberation. He would only see one chance. "Guardian!" He called at last before a wait. "I have made my decision!" With certainty the prince announced. His bold assertion could be heard throughout.

"Yes?" The inquiring Guardian filled the area.

"I choose..." Ren began as the dome furnished with baited breath.


	7. Call me Ioz

Chapter 6

CALL ME IOZ

PART 1 - Defiance of the Sword

Silence hung in the dark dome of the chamber of the 10th Treasure of Rule, not even the sound of soft breaths could be rummaged from a channeling echo.

"Guardian! I choose Tula!" The voice of the terrific prince powered throughout the chamber. What then waited was a great pause of the whole astral-realm. Ren watched down at the lambency below, wondering if he had made the right decision.

Below him a thick stump appeared, which seemed to have a mass emanating from inside of it. It glistened, surrounded by a compact cluster of the vines analogous to the ones stringing him up. The wearisome break of motion tapped through the void again.

"Who is this, Tula?" The Guardian's inquest rung out over the chamber.

"I am Tula!" Tula's courageous voice hesitantly came forward, slightly audible in the vacant dome. The light from the floor started to show. "Your Guardianship..." She carried with slowness and quieting reserve. Only a few moments passed before a stem flowed down to the rooted bottom of the hollow enclosure, taking Tula with it. It set her on the glowing surface close to the tree as the vines untangled themselves from around her. Freed, she scanned around. She searched for her friends but failed to see them through the continual shade.

"Remember, if you are unable to recover the Treasure, you and your company will be trapped within this dome...forever..." The Guardian's sousing sign faded out, as if it disappeared completely.

Tula observed the tree stump. She sensed there was something from within, but it could not be reached. She concentrated her energy, bonding with the twiggy vines on her hands as they moved away. She refrained to take in an awaited breath, tired from the long excursion. She could now see the roots without the vegetation, fully exposed. She pushed herself with resolve when she knelt down with deep application of her mind. She visualized the stub splitting open from the center. Revealing a core and overflowing with energy, she felt it. All it needed to do is flay. She envisioned it parting, opening. She could feel herself starting to fold, the edges of the stump splayed out farther away from an object. She saw what appeared to be a spiral, a violet-colored helix. She panted, needing to crack her eyes. Her ears sung. The chamber hued with a dead calm as she came to, and poised with the rest of her verve. Within the peeled base, she detached a shimmering coil of a crystalline miracle. "It's here!" Tula relinquished, she balanced her breath and shouted upward with the remaining drops of stamina she kept.

"You did it, Tula!" Praised a joyful sound reaching Tula's ears from above, but she couldn't tell from whom or where it hailed. She stood too low to the ground. The crinkling noise filled the space and then three lit sprouts cascaded down, stretching through the invisible shadows to the radiant floor. Ren and Ioz arrived on feet with Niddler, the rigid vines released them.

"Farewell, Son of Primus. My life is short as the Treasure of the Wise now becomes yours." The Guardian evoked his final words as his voice faded out into a pearly abyss. The room filled with a blinding light of white which then became a forest, resonating much of the same as the one before. The stump root containing the Treasure evaporated into thin air.

"I guess the tree was part of the Guardian of Kyanna's village, he was only here to guard the Treasure." Ren observed with a smile as he hugged Tula, putting an arm around her, to which she smiled back. He made the right decision.

"It's beautiful. Isn't it, Ren?" The ecomancer joyfully extolled in a warm expression as she lay the Treasure over her palms, it impressed and felt about as big as both of her hands. The two of them studied the vibrant gem of purple, it began to pulsate when Ren touched it.

"I guess it's reacting to the Treasure within me." Ren mused in a curious manner, he acutely shaped a smirk.

"It's a real beauty. Now, we can go." Ioz muttered tiredly while stretching his arm, which seemed to be sore from being leashed with soggy ivy.

"We don't know where the way out is, we're far away from where the leviathan was." Niddler reasonably added to the difficulty. He bobbed his head forward to converse, gathering around the trio.

"I doubt we could go back that way at all, monkeybird." Ioz seriously vocalized as he pondered, trying to come up with a solution.

"Well I can't just fly all of you there, it would take too long!" Niddler prattled in response, he too baffled over what to do. He assumed he was expected to contribute a resolve to the dilemma, which he drew a blank at. "Not to mention...wing-cramp." The thought of aching wings made him cringe.

"Maybe we don't have to, Niddler, maybe there's another way back." Ren figured cumbrously, he lost his momentum with the effort to conjure an idea. "The leviathan couldn't have taken us that far inland from the Wraith. It felt like a longer ride because we weren't used to going that fast." He analytically inferred, trying to logicalize a better plan to go back.

"It sounds like a good idea, Ren, but how do you suggest we go about it?" Tula queried, tacking her critique to the debate. Ren needed to have more behind this notion than a simple observation. Their skipper often concocted good strategies, but it would not be uncommon for him to slip up. She passed the 10th Treasure to him and he pocketed it in his vest.

"Ouch! Chungo lungo, that was lucky...I don't think my fancy investment will protect against poison-nettles." Ioz plucked his arm from a batch of prickly stingers branching from the woodland, he swiped the sleeve of his coat of many colors over the wound.

"I wish you would stop wearing that and taking it with you everywhere, you know it's going to get you in a bind sooner or later and you of all people should know Zoolie as a reliable source for word on trouble." Tula discouraged the helmsman's stubborness to take the rainbow garment off.

"Why leave it on the Wraith, Tula, when someone could steal it? With a coat that makes me look this good to the bar-maidens, I have to wear it." Ioz rapt with pride, seeing all was fit in his docking-plans.

"Well, I think it looks ridiculous and any bar-maid will know you're showing your true colors. Just ask Niddler, you look like you dance on a Pandaawa night-barge!" Tula returned with a tensed suggestion while Ioz ground his teeth and curled his knuckles. Niddler shook his head, not getting into this flack.

"If I'm right, we should be able to follow the river back to the shore." The prince scanned his surroundings, hazily familiarizing himself. "I think I know this area. I've heard of it before. There's a delta that goes all the way to the sea." He tapered off, perplexed when he considered his next action.

"Then by Kuunda I hope you're right, Ren. We need to take a break soon or we'll be leviathan-bait ourselves when we get lost out here. I don't want to think about what will happen when Bloth catches us roasting on a skewer in the middle of nowhere-and his return isn't exactly a question of if, my friend." In concern of the situation Ioz mitigated through the mess.

"Ioz has a point, how will we make it down the river when we don't even have a boat?" With a driving clarity, Tula alerted on another limitation added. The four ruminated on their quandary.

Ren tread toward a nearby tree with draping vines, trying to decide what to do. He gave the stalk a good once-over. It would take forever to build something to ferry them back, that would not be an option. They could float on a log but that would not be very functional carrying the Treasure a far distance. He had leaned forward to gain a closer perspective at bark on a tree when a sprig moved to face where the 10th Treasure of Rule had been placed. "Huh?" Ren exclaimed with surprise. He snatched the Treasure out of his tunic and propped it to the vine, the plant receded. "I've got it!" He cheered with a wondrous excitement, finding answer to his bind.

"Got what Ren?" Ioz questioned as he lumbered over to his captain with bizarre enticement, a nosy Tula and monkeybird following.

Ren pushed the Treasure at the moving stem. "It looks like the Treasure can control the vines, what if it can influence other things too? If it can, we can use it to bend the trees to take us back!" The blond lad ecstatically promoted the new plan aloud, gleaning with a skillful resolve to his muddle.

Tula stared at the jewel in bewilderment. She watched as another of the wringing vines dislodged upon sweeping it with the Treasure. "By the seas of Merr, Ren. It must have ecomantic properties!" She awed when she brushed the bauble close to a consecutive tree and it slid to the side. "I wouldn't be able to carry us all with my powers alone, but it sure looks like this Treasure can!" The ecomancer lauded with wonder and admiration.

"Not afraid of being shown up by a Treasure, are we Tula?" Ioz crassly remarked as he peered at the attractive magic-user, who was palming the Treasure.

"Not everyone is self-conceited like you are, Ioz. Personally, I'm a bit relieved." Tula shot him an irritated hint and shifted her green specks to a glare.

"Spare me the compliments, woman. I just want a safe way to haul our swag." Ioz smugly blathered, dispensing a stare back.

"You'll get it, you gantha-washing bilge-hatch! Ren, if Ioz wants to be manly, then he can do so on his own." Tula hissed, crossing her arms with a huff and shunning the strapping navigator.

"That's enough, you two." Ren intervened quickly and moderately between his sparring partners. "If we can climb up this tree and I can use the Treasure to propel us all forward, we should be able to get to the shore. There we'll be able to stop for a rest, only a little longer. By then we'll hopefully be able to find some way to help the Imbibers as well." The young prince ascertained with a phrase, latching onto the starting tree to climb it. After stowing the Treasure away, he began to scale his way up. Tula shimmied after.

"We're traveling by tree. Now they tell me." Niddler satirically jabbered. He threshed his wings and joined the two at the top.

"How am I supposed to get up?" With a fussy growl Ioz demanded a concluding answer to Ren's hunch as he clenched the 9th Treasure of Rule in his embrace. No sooner did he ask than a bungling vine reached down and raised him up. "What's next on this crazy quest?!" He babbled, uproarious and stammered.

"This is amazing, Tula. We can go anywhere with this Treasure in hand!" Ren laughed with jubilation, he flew from treetops above the level undergrowth with the spiral secured in his hand. The branches vaulted like a catapult, the green leaves of the foliage and the vines acting as a protective barrier against the long decline of the forest floor. Dazzling plants and flowers littered the skies and canopies. Many things could be surveyed from the alpine vantage-point. The ecomancer and pirate pursued close behind, the crowns of the stalks shooting them like slingshots. "We should be to shore in no time." He celebrated as he staunchly clapped a branch on the subsequent tree. Tula frolicked gleefully as she soared from the high tufts.

"Speak for yourself! You have the light Treasure!" The gliding Ioz gruffly complained as he crashed into a thicket of brush, stumbling to confine the orb that was wrapped firmly in his arms. "Scot pango." He let out under thwarted breath as he clasped on to the dense ball.

Niddler hovered above. "Sure, let's just hope nothing else in this crazy forest ambushes us." The sunset monkeybird whinnied out with a nervous air in his throat.

"Ahhhh!" The youthful man's voice screamed as the others around him heard. Twigs vibrated from where his form previously laid, heads snapped around.

"Ren!" Tula and Ioz synchronically called out for their fallen friend.

"I had to open my beak..." Niddler ironically whined.

Ren had hit his head when he fell, he stirred to press a hand on the top of his scalp to collect himself. He envisioned he made a mistake, somehow. When he stretched to collect the dropped Treasure, he discovered to his horror, it had vanished. "Noy jitat!" He roused as he perceived a noise through the rustling trees. The silhouette ran, he witnessed someone making off with the Treasure! "Come back!" Ren furiously strove after the contention and tore for the mysterious character through the woods. Ioz and Tula slid down after him, Niddler had come in for a landing.

"Ren, stop! Wait up!" Tula hollered out in a frenzy as she rushed to catch up with the buoyant aristocrat. The evasive figure drew farther away from the trio. Niddler lagged behind.

Ren forcibly needed to stop and gather his breath. His arms were hanging down in midair, he no longer saw the shady and very-fast fiend. "No..." He painfully shuddered out. The bunch sprinted up to him.

"Where are you going?" Ioz yelled out to his buddy with flurried exhaustion.

"They have the Treasure!" Ren hollered out, infuriated as he heaved.

"What?!" Ioz replied with a doubletake. This Quest had become very cumbersome. Ren didn't say who has the Treasure. Bloth, he guessed. He did not dismount in time to see who took it. He backed up to scout around for any escape possibilities the enemy could have utilized. He spun around once, venturing to get a clear view of his surroundings. "Chungo lungo!" He ruefully rapt. Something bumped him. He reeled away in shock to review the offender. "Scorrion! You chunga-lungan naja-dog! What are you doing here, thief?!" He blustered with astoundment before the brutish and bulky redhead, as on the side of a troop of pirates behind.

"I was about to ask you the very same thing, Ioz!" Scorrion's growled pitch abraded, the outlaw sprung in reverse at seeing his old rival in the same place.

"What have you been up to, shardfish? Stealing more maps, hmmm?" Ioz sorely grizzled an insinuation, though only half-heartedly.

"Don't tell me you're still storming about that now, denbar-scud." Under a crinkled brow Scorrion gnarled back, but only partially irritated.

"No, Scorrion, I've found better things to do." Ioz chuckled in a pretentious bombast.

"Is that so, scurvy-crook? Well so have I!" Scorrion retorted back with impressiveness. Ioz flung him a conceited glance, about to open his mouth. This went on until Ren interrupted, sensing this would continue.

"Ioz, we need to find where the Treasure went." Ren approached his diverted shipmate with imperativeness, pulling him away by the arm. The tough sailor tried to protest. Ren focused on Scorrion. "Did you by any chance, happen to see someone run past here?" He stabbed at the chance the disputing buccaneers may know something.

"Run past here? Hah. I saw no one, what I did see were those low-down cheats who stole our Squall's figurehead-gem. Don't know what the thieves want with it but it's ours and we want it back!" Scorrion blasted in a searing tirade. He behaved as though he wanted to slash something to pieces with his sword, which he waved through the air.

"Heh! Scorrion you're mad over a jitatan bowsprit-jewel? Now who's the greedy wharf-scud?" Ioz clamored with a boisterous banter at the fire-crested swashbuckler. Scorrion grunted.

"Wait!" Tula interrupted via a shuffle between, coming to an idea. "Who do you think stole from you, Scorrion?" She asked in correlation, striving to gather information. "Could it be possibly the same person who stole the Treasure from us?" The empath sought, she felt a sense about the stranger who had dashed away. Ren switched his regard to her, listening to her intuitive suggestion.

"I know jitatan well who stole from us! It's the Captain of the Monsoon, Taneuka!" Scorrion roared outloud, foul in ire.

"Taneuka?! Noy jitat! The Taneuka? The jitatan Lady-Pirate Taneuka?!" Ioz almost floored from recognition. He had not heard such a name for as long as he could remember.

"Of course her, ya know 'er scoundrel?" Scorrion noisily snorted, gawking at his old adversary in a less-than-sore interest.

"I know her, Scorrion." Ioz responded, appearing to be aloof at the mention of only the woman's name, the name recalling so many vastly-forgotten memories. "I've had such a crazy history with that ji-ta-tan-female." The robust bandit muttered aloud, distracted and lost in folly.

"Crazy history?" Scorrion batted an eyebrow and oddly remarked at the peculiar comment from his peer.

"He means he used to have-" Tula bit her lip and began to say something smart before she was abruptly impeded by Ren's forthcoming dynamism.

"Anyway. If you know her, Ioz. Then perhaps you can be of help to both of us? We must recover the Treasure! The Quest!" Ren stalked over to his daydreaming friend, directing by an insistence. He furrowed his eyebrow at Ioz, who did not seem to be paying any reverence to him.

Ioz noticed Ren hovering around him and became startled from his fanciful state. "Oh! Right Ren. Uhh, well I haven't talked to her in a long time...and I don't need to talk to the chunga-lunga sea-witch." Ioz babbled on, shifting his eyes away from Ren's immediate stare that forced itself vehemently in his face.

"Right." Ren conceived a wily smirk and turned face to Scorrion and his crew, in preparation to speak.

"Looks like Ioz and Scorrion will be partnering up again, this should be interesting." Tula glanced over with a witty smile at Ioz, cleverly revealing of connections to come.

The location the two crews were stationed was one abreast a mass of water, the delta poured out into seas beyond.

"We'll take you guys with us, s'long as you help us find our gem. You guys can get your Treasure back." Scorrion reluctantly agreed to the union of hands for the purpose of tracking down the Monsoon and it's captain, Taneuka. "Our ship is docked not far from this jitatan brackish-slew, come on if ye got legs." Scorrion beckoned for the four of them to follow.

"I don't like this at all, woman!" Ioz fought rigidly in protest. "Taneuka is a crazy sea-devil! The last time I talked to her she nearly tossed me into a barrel of darva-worms! She's a hard-hearted witch, and she puts her crew in danger for a Quest to slay a white leviathan because she thinks it stole her father's heirloom!" Ioz unkindly ranted and raved, not budging until his crewmates were practically dragging him. "I'll team up with Scorrion, but not with the jitatan woman!" He complained as his beady eyes of black darted to his ex-enemy, who seemed to be almost as amused by Ioz's reaction as his friends were.

"Come on, Ioz. She can't be all that bad, she probably feels as shy about seeing you again as you do with her." Tula smiled and attempted to nudge the stubborn wayfaring-companion of her's out of his obstinacy.

"I tell you, Tula, the woman is mad! Ji-ta-tan insane!" Ioz shouted, throwing a fit. He fixed to his place on the shore.

"What's the matter Ioz, did she find a pirate more handsome than you?" Scorrion teased, entertained from against the sandbar as he loaded supplies upon the Squall with his adjacent crew.

"Shut your blubbering-jitatan mouth, Scorrion! The only reason I'm not beating you into a sand-blasting shipwreck is because it would ruin my serene demeanor!" Ioz threatened from a standstill, shaking his fist at the mocking foe and then grumbling. Scorrion nearly burst out into a spilling guffaw.

"Ioz..." Ren began to trill. He looked Ioz right in the eyes and grinned. "If you don't come with us, you'll be all alone here." He sharply prodded the sore crewman. Tula couldn't keep from laughing.

"So?" Ioz snappily returned. He jolted his vision away, avoiding linear confrontation with the young prince.

"I think Ioz has a case of the old seawoman-troubles! If you don't come along, you can't show your man-mate how macho you are!" Tula added on with a giggle, digging the man's embarrassment further. Ioz stood gritting his teeth, seemingly ready to holler out again.

"Well Tula, I think we should let Ioz make his own decisions. After all, maybe he'd prefer to ride to the ship by sand instead." Ren quipped as he motioned to Tula and then rolled his gaze back at the unyielding buccaneer. "Of course we could always have Niddler carry him, after all, he has helped us a lot with keeping the 9th Treasure safe. Unless of course, he'd prefer to stay here and spar with a lighthousekeeper he can't possibly defeat." Ren charmingly sung, crowding right in the face and asserting his meaning. Ioz perused his gander away and then finally focused his glint at the taunting royal. Ioz growled an unpleasant breath, relenting in turn.

"Kyanna's women left us alone because of the flying spirit!" Joiquiva and Lus-nayi ambled over the ferns, scampering to catch up with Ren and Tula just as Ioz reeled. They hesitated when they saw Scorrion, Ren met them half-way.

"Flying spirit...Nimbo." Ren decided the name of the character the Wraith's league was designated to catch at Kyanna's request. The orphans had positively deduced their journey was safer travelling with the crew than alone, and quietly found solace ducking under Niddler's wingspan.

"Those thorns must have been poison-nettles! I can barely see...Ren! Tula! You'll have to go on without me..." Ioz was immediately dumbstruck by a severe illness, wooziness spun in his yowling stomach and diziness confused his eyes. He grasped his heart through the colorful coat, his clammy hands flinched. Ren and Tula stopped, overcome with woe for his affliction.

"Poison-nettle remedy!" Seeing him fall, the twins hastily beat around a nearby bush and arose with two pale leaves. Four pairs of able hands melded the medicine into a thick paste and brewed it into a delicious drink. When the two bowed to pray Ioz carefully sipped it and put it at arm's length. He groaned, then he gulped the entire flask. His pupils perked as if nothing had caused him sick.

"Ioz won't say it but I will, thanks girls." Tula commended the duo, presenting them both a much-needed hug.

"If we join you can you find the Guyfoo Capsule for us, so we can bring our parents back to life...and restore Lus-nayi's value in our village?" Joiquiva created a seat in the turf and offered Tula's favor.

"The Treasures of Rule are better than the Guyfoo Capsule, we'll show you!" Tula promised to accompany, to the sisters' glee. "We just need to get it back from Captain Taneuka, Ioz's old girlfriend, so we can continue our Quest...we would have already except that stick-in-the-mud Ioz doesn't want to see her so while he stays here and pities himself we're going aboard Scorrion's ship, before he shoves off without us. So, I guess our encouragement won't even do the tric-" She verbalized her aggravation at the stickling shipmate.

"Fine!" The somber thief huffed. "But as soon as we get the Treasure, we go!" Ioz demanded, pouting and crossing his arms. He at last trudged his feet from the spot he had fused them to.

"That's more like it, so glad you came around, Ioz. It would be really lonely without you." Ren smiled at him, continuing to thrum in tone as he led his grouchy pal to the gangplank.

"Ren, you should be so lucky I consider you my own brethren, otherwise you can be assured I would take you up on that offer. Ay chunga." Ioz grudgingly trekked off with Ren in the direction of Scorrion's ship, mumbling curses to himself when he picked up his sword.

The Squall roved through the prodigious field of seas in search of the ship called the Monsoon, which would promise to contain the treasures of two merged crews.

"Well, Scorrion. Looks like she's no where to be seen." Ioz uttered plainly from lounging around on the deck, Scorrion and the fairly-plentiful crew had been drifting for far too long. He found nothing interesting to do.

"That's because you're so impatient, you lily-livered sore-eyes!" Scorrion barked out, flustered from the consistent explorer. He steered on, mist began to flood about the area.

"Or you're getting us lost, you ill-sea-fated rascal!" Ioz sat up and began a cynical retort. "Great! Now we'll really be lost! Noy jitat!" He harshly swore at the surrounding fog.

"Ok, everyone. I think we've tossed enough words back and forth. Who would like to tell some old pirate's tales? Come on, there must be someone! How about the Ghost of Khaddar Bay?" Tula cheered peacefully, playing the referee. She stood over the middle of the ship, trying to cast some light on to the situation and calm the troubled seas. Having a fight break out would be bad.

"Here's one for you, Tula! This jitatan mist is going to swallow us up in a spring-tide!" Ioz griped aloud, he attempted to swat away the covering fog that was concealing his vision.

"Not if I have anything to say about it! Full speed!" Scorrion bellowed out as he swung away with sails catching the wind. The fog ever slightly began to settle out.

"Tula! That's not the only problem we have! Dark water on the port bow!" Niddler hurriedly squawked out from the air, two orphans shrieking at the engulfed trunk encased in the bobbing crest of the spate underneath. He had flown away from the surveying railing of the ship to report the news.

"Say what?!" Scorrion exclaimed, awestruck.

"Noy jitat!" Ren cursed and scampered to the edge of the hull and saw the blackened substance creeping up the side. "Niddler, the Treasure!" He wildly called to the flying companion hovering above him. "Ioz, you'll have to go out! You're closest to the Treasure! We can't wait too long or it will destroy the ship!" His gaze fell pleadingly on Ioz as he roused him to action. "Tula, help me help Scorrion's crew with the tacking!" The sand-maned regent commanded the order as he dashed away to help Tula and the rest of the shiphands fight to keep the sail hoisted.

"Noy jitat. We're back to using this clunky thing, as if there were ever a worse time for this." Ioz subdued his grumble, having long given up the suggestion anything would go smoothly from this point onward. With weariness, he heaved the Treasure into his grasp. "Hurry up Niddler! Before we go by the board!" He directed as the brightly-feathered monkeybird dove down to take him up. Ioz dexterously approached the dark water with the Treasure. It lashed out viciously at Scorrion's craft of wailing men but recoiled and fled when it touched the heavy sphere, screaming away from the bastion. The flood balanced out and the covetous goo receded. Unfortunately, Niddler slipped while trying to retain the weight of Ioz and they splashed into the drenching tide. "Watch it, monkeybird!" He growled as he spit out unwelcome brine.

"Man overboard!" Scorrion sounded the alarm, albeit unwillingly.

"Sorry!" Niddler crowed meekly. "At least there are more hands now!" He cawed, trying to add a positive spin to the situation. He returned with the roguish sailor to touch down on the deck before any ropes needed to go tidal.

"Aye, and you don't know how much I'm anticipating the moment when it's just us again, Niddler." Ioz commented, rather sedately. The sea straightened out and clear water resumed a natural ebb and flow.

"With all the flying and carrying you're doing, you're going be a handsome monkeybird soon!" Tula rushed over to pet the athletic avian with a pleasant encouragement.

"That almost makes it worth it!" Niddler faced forward and squawked. Smoldering a shy blush, he stretched his wing muscles.

"Ship approaching! Starboard!" Swar's voice screamed from the pier. He enclosed a looking glass to his eye and pointed at the windward-sweeping vessel.

"Fifteen links, dead ahead! There she is! Avast!" Scorrion shouted out in excitement from the helm. "We'll pull 'er in close!" Scorrion clamored, he performed a hard turn in foresight of the ship. He pulled aside until the Squall became level with the small galleon.

"You! What do you want?" The groan of a rough but shrill-pitched male called out from across the waves where the hulls met alongside.

"What's rightfully mine!" Scorrion severely charged.

"Our Treasure, Uley!" Ioz amassed in the fracas.

"Get lost, shoddy losers! Our gold doesn't belong to you...especially you, topknot-man!...And how do you know my name?! Go away before we ram you!" The scratchy and high-tuned man powered from the hostile terrace.

"Then we'll take your mast down, smool-rats!" Scorrion turbulently voiced in preparation for a big fight at sea, he fiercely chucked his blade. Scorrion occupied more men in his crew, including those of the Wraith. The Monsoon exceeded in size, however.

"That's enough, Uley. I want to know what these windbags want." The tide-bound salts stood aside, still, when they heard a woman's regard pour from out of the dregs of the warship. The smooth and durable figure tapped way from the steering mechanism and out to the observation jetty on the platform, where she could clearly be seen. The sunset-blond with fair skin bore eyes at the strangers' ship.

"Ay chunga!" Ioz startlingly met his gaze upon the explorer's captain, she hadn't changed a bit since he saw her last.

"Ioz?!" Captain Taneuka almost fainted when her sapphire glimpse cast on the dusk-imbued pirate on the floater, she called out the name of her old-squeeze in trepidation.

PART 2 - The Moonsail Festival

The cloudy skies of Merr at sea had conformed in the midday sun when two frigates joined together in union. Crews from three skiffs flocked into one grand brigade, the heavy Squall drifted in the wind.

"We were hoping you would grant us back what your crew stole from us." Ren genially modulated to the reasonable woman, who seemed to be considering with wiggling eyes continuously peeking at the muscular sailor with spanning locks of black. She seemed to be bashfully avoiding. Ioz hugged a nullity with arms crossed, and whirled his head in many directions.

"Oh, forgive me, young lad. I may not be able to do this. However, I did not order my crew to steal from you in particular. I sent them out for some much needed-supplies on our only rescue dory, but I did not expect them to return with anything at all. You see, we need all the help we can get." The ringlet-hemmed captain dolefully explained. "Normally I would be willing to favor you, but our ship and crew have endured much torment from other privateer ships. Our distress signals have been unreceived or ignored and we have become lost at sea. We have more than enough gold to make repairs, if we could only come upon land. Easement from this cruel circumstance may come if only we could drag our way there." Taneuka diplomatically clarified, reluctant to oblige. Her name was feared by many sailors. She was ruthless when need be, but she was not a savage. She took favor on the young man who was speaking to her, but she could not prevent her attention from fluttering away.

Ren considered this. He scoured toward his right-side and his expression formed a half-smirk amid a thought. "Why can you not reach land?" The golden-haired youth asked in detail of the fit lady-pirate. "If you are lost, maybe we can be of help to you." Ren optimally suggested. He needed to help her, she also still possessed the Treasure. He awaited her response.

"Give back our jewel, now!" Scorrion yelled cantankerously, not in the mood for settling things in a civil manner. He protested as Tula and the rest of his crew were required in holding him back to let Ren barter.

"It's useless, Ren. She's as solid as an Octarian Ox." Ioz batted an iris of deep onyx to indicate, he set his sights on the woman of his affections. He composed fragile eye-contact.

Ren gave Ioz a heavy inspection, he tried to penetrate the austere aura. "Ioz, I think you might be of help to us if you would only talk to her." The adolescent edged pensive eyes of blue at the man next to him, Ioz did not meet with him. Taneuka appeared to be flustered or embarrassed at Ioz's statement, but she withheld emotion.

"The dark water is too insidious for our ship to move through. We have been stranded out at sea for weeks now, meeting storm after storm." Taneuka mournfully loomed in point. She motioned above her to a partially-torn sail. "Kuunda has been unforgiving with us, as you can see from our sail, we're not in shape for venturing. Soon, we will not be seaworthy at all. Should our ill-fortune persist." The lady-captain tensely went on. She normally would not gossip to strangers about the weaknesses of her position, but she felt like she could trust this boy. Ren, he had introduced himself as. Son of King Primus of Octopon, he preposterously proclaimed. Taneuka did not believe he confessed the truth to her, but she did not really care about one's own self-conceited notions. She knew of bigger things to worry about, and he had Ioz with him, besides.

"Dark water?" Ren questioned the pretty superior notably, and then his initiative changed to one of sense. "Taneuka, we can help you! We have with us one of the Thirteen Treasures of Rule! If we keep it with us, we can drive the dark water away from your ship!" Ren declared presumptuously at the relentless captain, who now looked doubtful.

"What? That's impossible. The Thirteen Treasures of Rule are a myth! They don't exist!" Captain Taneuka floored, she almost felt anger rising within her. Not only did this boy speak incomprehensible things about being the Prince of Octopon, but he also said he touted some mystical gem to repel dark water.

She would put an end to this lunacy at once. She had been ready to issue the order to her crew to throw these liars out. Whether Ioz had been with them or not made no difference to her when it was jettison for the remainder of these clowns, she could not put up with this reckless endangerment forged on falsehoods. She slowly began to unsheathe her blade.

"It's true, Taneuka. Don't do anything foolish, you always were an impulsive soak-head. If you throw Ren out, this wind-blown shack won't last another moonrise." Ioz at last lipped, to the shock of everyone aboard the ragged galleon. Ren's stun focused frightfully on the cutlass the captain had begun to draw, he did not even see it, and would not have. Ioz poised from leaning against the mast, his fingers had stopped drumming on his entwined arms as he prompted his severe upbraid.

What? Taneuka didn't think Ioz stuttered. Ioz didn't lie. To her. If Ioz said something was so, it was so. "Ioz!" Taneuka nearly screamed with disbelief. "How do you say such a thing?" She shuddered out. Foremost, she was awed he opened his mouth. To say, this? The Captain of the Monsoon had heard many tales, most of them lore. She wouldn't believe it if she had been given a memorat's notes.

"By the way, he's true as the twenty seas the Prince of Octopon, too." Ioz supplemented pompously, as if he had read her thoughts. He quite possibly could have. Taneuka's eyes flickered with astonishment, she shelved her sword.

"Right!" Ren grinned, primed and fluently-crafty in words. "Let's get this ship a new sail!" He directed about to the mass around him.

Time elapsed to a tidy degree. Both the crews of the Wraith and of the Squall had at last harmoniously joined forces to patch the sail of the Monsoon. Fortunately, Scorrion's crew kept a lot of borca-paste on-hand.

"Niddler! Are you done up there yet? Noy jitat, watch where you're shoving that thing!" Ioz attentively shouted, dodging a bucket of stinky mire the monkeybird carelessly swabbed in his face.

"Sorry, Ioz!" Niddler squawked, demurely apologetic. "I'm done with my end!" The red-feathered bird chirped out.

"Good. You, Scorrion?" Ioz affirmed and shifted his eased glare to the tough scalawag on the other end of the mast. Soon, they would be finished.

"Got it, Ioz. Ay jitata!" The broad man grizzled. For an interval he almost fell as he uttered a curse, but he righted himself. He climbed down with Ioz and the rest of the seafarers who had climbed aloft to the boom. Lus-nayi and Joiquiva finished the weaving of hems then the braiding of the foot to the clew on the topsail. The pace through the sea-crest increased substantially.

"We can't thank you enough Ren, Captain of the Wraith, and crew. Your help will at least get us to port from here. There must be something we can do to repay you." Taneuka courteously addressed the reputable prince and his companions. Her heart-shaped ensemble of curls blew in the air as she beamed up at the now-repaired sails of her once-mighty ship. Her gaze of bright azure trimmed upon Scorrion, who cleaved out his hand and had become testy. She composedly handed him her fee of the stolen jewel from the Squall's figurehead. He then conducted to flee on his own clipper, roaming off with his scurrilous league. She and Ioz interacted very scantly.

"If you would, Taneuka, we did come to get our Treasure back." Ren petitioned sheepishly with Niddler by his side, who behaved in a nosy order.

"Oh! You must mean this!" The Captain of the Monsoon signaled to an object her first-mate carried and handed Ren a glistening spiral of lilac hue. "I don't know what purpose it will serve you, but it's not any use to us and it will most likely suffice you a lot better anyway." Taneuka smiled with a kindly grin when conversing with Ren.

"Thank you very much, Taneuka." Ren beamed once more and gracefully thanked the lady-pirate.

"No problem. It's been a distant era since I have heard anything about the Treasures of Rule myself. I originally knew about them from my mother, before our falling out. You see, she was a noblelady from Octopon and hopelessly afflicted with an unrequited crush on King Primus. Though I never believed I would meet his son personally, I am quite glad I have." Taneuka offered with some receptivity. She believed this would be the last thing she would tell.

"Taneuka, do you mean that my father and-" Ren stuttered in a fleeting moment.

"It can only be!" Tula gasped within her claim.

"Your mother's name was Cray?" Ren wondered with an expression agape. Taneuka appeared dumbfounded and Ioz equally so, however the loner did not disturb.

"Yes, it is. How do you know her name? Her and Primus ended long before I could remember." Captain Taneuka sobered as she concluded her divulgence, she desired to know more.

"We ran into her at some point during the Quest we've embarked on. I didn't think my father liked Cray any more than another friend." Ren uplifted his confusion, still stunted by the news.

"He didn't." Taneuka suddenly refuted such significance. "I'm no princess, I have no idea of my background. My father only left me a relic, a Margar statue after mother and I moved to Kalinda. Such began my hunt for the white leviathan that stole it from me. Enough of this though, it's not my preference to speak of such embittering subjects. How was my mother when you saw her?" The she-boater was conjured by humanitarian concern.

Ren delayed with an answer. "She did something to try to relive her past." Finally, the sympathetic royalty transferred his empathy into words. Taneuka not only seemed to instantly connect, but to pine as well.

"That doesn't surprise me. Growing up with her wasn't what led me to the sea, running from home did. Sailing was a nice escape back then, but I guess you could say I'm questing for something myself now, something that can't be reproduced. Ioz would know the mourning I speak of." Taneuka had been perceptively grief-stricken when she carried her scrutiny toward the teammates. She briefly lapsed an eye to the silent-but-watching crewmate of her history. "Ren, I owe you tremendously. A great deal you have done for me in my time of need, is there anything I may help you with?" Taneuka implored with a lightened demeanor.

"It's been an honor Taneuka, but we need to find our way back and to our ship. There are more people we have to save, right now our goal is to help the Imbibers, and everyone ruined by the dark water." Ren sensibly prompted their objective.

"Find a good home for Joiquiva and Lus-nayi, too." Tula laughed as she hugged the gandering Quiin twins.

"We'll find them the right home, Tula. One where they will be honored for their spirit and stow from Bloth's pirates." Ren would keep faithful in every vow he made to Tula and to trust her judgement, as he had spoken so once before. This bout the devoted Andorian was more partial on protecting the latest additions to the ragtag misfits, even more than Ren would be.

"Wait, Ren." Tula chimed in. "We don't know where we are, we're as lost out to sea as they are. Ever since we lost the 10th Treasure to Taneuka's men." The pertinent shipmates of the Wraith fastened sight at Tula's note as she unraveled the correct difficulty in their plan.

"That's right..." Ren solemnly muttered, he lost himself in analysis until the captain interrupted his devices.

"Is that so, travelers? If you tell us where you wish to go, we may take you there. Though we may be lost in the realm of port, we have circled too many times alongside the landstrip you may be privy to. It is the least we can do to repay you for your troubles." Captain Taneuka smiled, polite in inquest. Ioz stared at her, she kept her eyes at him.

"Actually, we are trying to get back to a certain place." Ren happily sustained. He could not refuse her invitation.

The Monsoon set sail and heaved onward. The ice between the estranged old-flames finally broke.

"I see my cabin-sister's memory has been protecting you." The rogue sea-woman trilled her perusal at a jade-green memento on Ioz's shoulders. "She was never a sister but she was everything you could ever want in one, an excellent shiphand to boot. Those were the days, back before I took to the high seas for any other reason but to sail." Captain Taneuka sighed, she talked to the rugged swashbuckler at her side. "It really hasn't been the same without my other half here. She made nice company, especially after father passed." Her aura rung melancholic, as if reminiscing over days long past.

"I never knew her, closely. At the time I was too provoked by her betrayal to care. I was worried about my own skin, and the skin of my colleague. I don't remember how old she would be now. It would be a beautiful Moonsail Festival, if it wasn't for all this." Ioz conveyed in deep and reflective words. He leaned, almost sitting next to his former beau as they rode through waters thick with black and blue.

"Thirty-two." Captain Taneuka sharply rattled without need to recall. She shot the bandit next to her a harsh but troubled glance.

"Ioz, would you mind telling Niddler to keep watch on port? The dark water is starting to come closer and from the other-side now-" Ren started to blurt in. "Did I interrupt something?" Ren edged over to the bridge as he inquisitively bothered the two pirates engrossed in discussion.

"We've got it, Ren! Don't worry! I think that was the last patch from this way." Tula called out from the deck with the rest of Taneuka's crew. Accordingly, all was in check. The side skirted around with little more than an unobstructed curve. Ren lashed a head to the femme and then centered his attention on the pair speaking, he vaguely picked up what they said.

"Wait, did the two of you used to..." Ren collected a clue but did not finish it, he tried formulate what they might be discussing. "Bloth?" He wondered, shooting the guess.

"She never joined Bluelips, Ren. She's been on her own board, for as long as I've known her." Ioz stated with a lousy sigh. He peeked at his buddy who showed both curiosity and perception.

"I'm impressed, you're the first woman on the seas of Merr I've seen who has been able to lead for this long. I can tell your crewmen respect you very much, I only wish Ioz and Tula would settle their bickering." Ren felt innocently intrigued with the unlikely leader who cared for her shiphands with such harmony and teamwork, he bashfully shied when Tula paid him study.

"Toughened-hearts aren't always cold-hearts, good prince, and that was so long ago." In a nostalgic simper Taneuka enjoined with her closest outlaw. Lovely eyes sweetly fluttered upon the youngster who seemed to be showing his youthful eagerness. She sensed he picked up on her thoughts when he walked back to where his female shiphand was stationed. The two carried on in their conversation. "Like you should not have, Ioz. Like she should not have. You wanted him to go down, why did you hang around so long, even before?" She responded to what the seadog previously chatted of, an essentially reprimanding concern.

"I was waiting for the right moment, Taneuka. It didn't come like I expected it would. I also didn't think I'd still be around after it came." Ioz spoke with barren words, his expression turned to one flinty and sullen. He started to remember things he genuinely wanted to forget, feeling a pinch contention that the woman of his past would even bring the horrific topic to ear.

"Ioz, as much as I respect your opinion as an experienced sailor, you should have gotten out of that bone-dump long before that atrocity happened." Taneuka's eyes shifted to the troubled swindler with a disapproving glare, she scolded him. "Even now, your vendetta is going to get you killed, just like it did her. Don't you think he still lets him do it?" The flushed lady-pirate fiercely warned, she absorbed the hate in his stressed glower.

"Why do you need to bring that up, Taneuka? I don't know if the kreld-eater still lets him do the heinous thing, chipunga woman! Ay chunga, I don't want to know. Don't even ask me about it!" Ioz spun around, his dissent became crystal when he shot his old-fire an intense and morbid stare. "I don't want to hear it mentioned again, woman. Not with me." His tone numbed like ice when he met her, his stony gaze sunk upon the floor.

"My Lady, we'll be arriving on shore soon as sunset!" The first-mate of Captain Taneuka's crew called out with anticipation.

"Good, Uley! Let's pull her in!" Taneuka ordered as she operated a wide turn in advance of the shores where the Imbibers and the Leviathan Worshipers dwell. The water forced itself out of the cruising ship's way.

"Are they still talking?" It had not been until sometime after the Monsoon came to a landing when Ren jabbed to the woman next to him, smirking wittily as he peered over the shoulder at his dear friend and the alluring rascal with him. Ioz was showing a side the prince had not seen from him before. He just managed to catch a glimpse of the two of them closely retaining the other person. It only lasted a moment, but it had been there. Ren laid his arm on the back of the ecomancer to his side.

"Looks like it." Tula observed of the duo strongly, making only a flimsy comment. She saw the twain heads meet and then slide away, acting as if it never happened to begin with. Her thoughts turned sour, for reasons unknown. She left her place.

"I will keep my promise to Tula, if she even wants it." Ren sulked in backwind of Tula's abandonment of his caress.

Taneuka was one of the few ladies with her Merrian skin husky and arid-hued as other buccaneers had seen her, but it was only for her method of using a fickle beauty that Ioz once loved her. Her siren grace could blow his sails far yonder, but it never suited submitting himself in obedience to her temperament. The ecomancer he knew was an entirely different breed of female than cold-hearted Taneuka, but her heart was not-hardly suited for a sailor or a monarch. From the time when he and Tula had left their assumed-to-be-departed friend on Pandaawa he knew the wench was like no other, but by Kuunda's Grace, the boy lived and the Quest continued. Monkeybirds and their freedom...a penchant for self-sacrifice was how the royal fool almost lost his skin. Of course Ren was too pure to be sailing the twenty seas of Merr. The lad earned his salt in a jitatan lighthouse, not aboard a ship of wharf-boys and later greedy thugs. So many times that magic-woman Ioz had met, far after the days of Taneuka's wooing, walked past him and taunted him. It was not by her bodily charm alone but by her fondness for another less-worthy of seamanship as he. Ioz had on occasion been lustfully tempted by a solution to his position on Tula from the perspective of pirates like Mantus or Bloth and needed to shake the awful feeling in his gut like a stone, the sad thing he knew was that she sensed this very darkness inside of him.

"So, Ioz...Counting the stars again." Tula brisked nigh the lonely pirate with the sea-devil on his shoulder.

"Don't you have a raft to rinse, woman?" Ioz backtracked his heart's impurity with a leg leap until he meandered by, his umbrella topknot slacking aimlessly and would not face the directed call as if he were fearstruck. Tula was easy enough to ignore but she noticed he had slipped in anger.

"Sorry for going off on you back there...old matey." Uley waddled on crooked toes to greet Ioz by the helm. "You know, I see that girl in pink over there with ye...quite a sea-flora, so she's your ummm-" He stammered a guess but his impatient witness didn't wait.

"No, she's just here for the ride. My captain wants to make her ship-wife." When Ioz set Uley straight he tugged on the cord of Taneuka's firm shoulder and began to kneed his fingers. Before first-mate Uley left, his jealous glint was hidden beneath the tress between his faded bald-patches.

"Is it about the plague on Andorus?" Ren hinted on Tula's stress as she watched Ioz prate on days gone by, his sorrow was sealed in every word though even with her senses she could not hear him speak. Tula sighed with an awful pain in her core. Taneuka stepped over to them.

"This is the place, isn't it? Thank you so much again, Ren. And Ioz." Captain Taneuka played, shifting her gander to the dauntless mate beside her. He said his parting with a whistle reserved only for her like a wolfish sea-man. Tula felt uneasy. Ioz dangled the fish-eye pendant he often wore on the underneath of his neck as he shone her a nod, goodbyes were always hard.

"We're ready alright! Now all we have to do is get back to the Wraith and then we can take a nice long rest at port. Thank you much Taneuka, we will pray for your journey to port as well!" The nobleman wearily appraised. He channeled away in direction, ready to disembark. He became the first to touch down when he planted his feet on the sandy beach, Ioz became the last to follow.

"If you need help again, just ask! Taneuka remembers those loyal to her!" The attractive lass of sun hue returned as she drove her bateau out, waiting for horizons beyond. Ren aided Tula through the sloping silt by her hand.

"Thanks for the offer, I'll keep that in mind." Solely, Ioz murmured in a spacey tune before he settled to the tracking trail on the sodden shoal.

"Noy jitat, she was nice but I think she had something up her sleeve." Tula suspiciously commented, in a way she usually did not. She did not figure why.

PART 3 - Unlucky Moon of the Third

The deep-orange sun began to sink low as the four adventurers trudged their way along the seaboard from whence they came. The skies were cloudless and the beach remained uninhabited. Within the quartet, the blond boy stalled upon the sandbar and perused it for any sign of life.

"Are you sure this is the right place, Ren? There's no one here." Niddler pointed out as his best-buddy sloshed through the wet sand.

"I'm positive, Niddler. This is where we were at." Ren attested when he roamed out from under some trees above, closer to province. Tula followed in his footsteps. Ioz stumbled on a rock in the way, almost dropping the monstrous Treasure that he kept ending up pawned with. Ren squinted at the aisle of beach across from him that contained the unmovable Imbibers. He recollected what he witnessed and quickly blocked it out of his mind. The monkeybird seemed to pick up on what he saw, because he asked no further questions.

"Where's the Wraith?" Tula piqued with budding concern as she rearranged her almond eyes to anything that may have resembled the vessel.

Ren scouted all the way to the shoreline before dropping a curse. "Noy jitat! Someone stole it!" The flaxen-hair anxiously hollered. Frustrated and upset, his mind churned to find the shyster who stole from them.

"Chipungo, and I think I know who!" Ioz plied a hint. He bolted to the edge of the shore where Ren positioned when he spotted out of the corner of his eye, a dot in the distance. "On the horizon! They didn't get away completely! We'll get the sea-bum's rush on those scummy sea-thieves!" Ioz rattled with boiling blood as he bounded forth and then dove into the water, leaving the Treasure on the bank. He hastened to swim out to the vessel, which fortunately did not plod very fast. Tula dashed to Ren's brink, scooping up the Treasure with her.

"Niddler, come on! We can't let Joat get his boat." Ren furiously invoked, whipping around to his tufted friend and commanding him with verbatim.

"Again?" Niddler whined but flew to rest on Ren's shoulders as the prince tightly cinched an arm around Tula's waist. The trio lifted off and into the air.

The deck of the recaptured Wraith distressed in argument as a scrap was taking place on deck. The vessel was nearly dead in the water, with no one at the helm.

"Where in the twenty seas is that bilge-blasted Treasure?!" Joat clipped a fat munchkin up by a metal-clawed hand, screaming into his face. He was about to go ballistic, feeling like he wished to throw the runt-of-a-man overboard. Three ruffians clustered by him, surrounding the suspended man.

"Konk don't know! The boy took it with him!" The chunky knave who resembled a pig shouted as he swung an ill-aimed punch at the hook-hand and kicked a pegleg toward the face. Joat easily dodged.

"You!" Joat squealed with a high-pitched and eccentric response, shoving his frown into the other man's head so they were almost nose-to-nose. He glared into the dumb crook's face, about to lose his temper. Then he cooled, shaking his free fist at the porcine-mutant and dropping him crossly to the ground. "You told him! You told, Him! It would be here!" Joat brayed and ripped off the hat he wore on his head and slapped it to the ground, giving it a stomp. He fumed in a shrill whinny of anger as the half-pint below him just sat slickly on the rump.

Konk, who had fallen to the deck with a plop, glared in a baffling bewilderment at the raging darva-dog before him. "It not Konk's fault you make deal with Bloth to catch boy for Wraith and coin. Konk just tell him he here and come along because-" The hoggish pirate began to slowly justify himself until he was interrupted.

"This is My Wraith, I'm just letting you use it! The slugger's pillaging blare bombarded, impending to tear loose with a resentful clacker. Joat clomped over, but unsettled at a summon.

"Yo, boss, there's a problem!" One of the crewmen on Joat's team raced up to the brute-head, who would have ignored him had he not grabbed by the back of the shirt. He beckoned to a triad of airborne invaders, who had now alit on the becalmed ship. The raid consisting of a juvenile man with a ponytail, in convergence with a brunet woman and a flutter of red feathers, landed and were now running remorselessly toward them.

"Noy jitat!" Joat ejected from his placement, he had been about to spill over with animosity until he saw the Treasure the company carted. "The Treasure! By the moons of Merr, my ship has come in! Get them!" He directed his dispatching boatmen, letting a grin reside on his face. I'll show them their reward for making me Laughingstock of the Twenty Seas! Joat silently cackled.

It took a lot of effort from Ren to slip and fight past Joat's attacking band of thieves, but he managed to either avert them or shake them off with his blade when he spun away. He rushed for Joat, slashing against the hook-claw with all he possessed behind his edgy sword. "Give it up!" Ren unrelentingly shouted with fierce acquisition.

Joat backed up as the boy slashed away at his steely paw. He could not grip a hold on him because the nimble youth moved too precisely. "Get the Treasure!" He hollered to his men as he made a swift move to evade Ren's stylet, which caused him to miss and fall into a crouching stumble before he rebounded to his feet to attack. Joat now fled directly for the Treasure, but he was pressed to fend off Ren.

Three swabs surged at Tula, who had slowed down from carrying the burdensome swag in her arms. The scuds were about to corner her on the starboard until a tired Niddler heaved her up and lugged her to the other side of the deck, which caused the bumbling dips to knock heads. Now Ioz had reached the Wraith and focused on climbing up the hull.

"Look in the sky, a flying man!" Tula motioned to a sweeping flash of red from the draft beyond, the unwelcome guest shuffled in the nearing gust. Ren defended the stock and unsettled to fumble for the Treasure behind a landing archer.

"Nimbo, you're the flying spirit! Why are you here?!" Ren escaped a star-point arrow through a wail as the super-flyer loaded another.

"I steal meat for Bloth!" The crimson scavenger confessed his purpose immediately as he donned a second mace forged from a sea-star's casing. Though Ren warded him to the end of the bridge the challenger excelled in marksmanship. The boy fended against green-locks with his sickled knife.

"Why?" Ren was all but discombobulated at such a reason Nimbo expressed, but not making so much of a difference in his outrage. The rogue aimed with the all concentration on one side of the face adverse the eye-patch, shooting a target only in his hopeful mind's glimpse.

"To present as an offering to Z.M.Q.!" Nimbo instantly swiped the Wraith's food supply and hauled over the ledge. His last arrow harmlessly abandoned, he jumped to touch the breeze and vanished mid-air.

"Z.M.Q.? Who?" Left in the petty-thief's dust, Ren picked up the pieces as he wrought Joat for the Treasure below his elbow. The gentle clouds an altitude overhead sprinkled with Nimbo's byway.

Konk tumbled for Ren in an attempt to repeat his success with his cleaver, knowing his evil boss would grant him a grandeur reward were he able to prove the claim of the adolescent's indestructibility, which the master did not believe. The pegleg sneered. He lobbed his weapon to an accessible mitt, about to tromp after the lad. "Konk get big reward for capturing shrewd boy." The grotesque porker chuckled as he furrowed his rusty blade at the quick-dueling boy, who nearly didn't see him advance.

Ren bailed out of the way just-in-time as Konk's hatchet connected with the air to his side. Joat swung his piercing hand after seeing an opening and Ren tripped in attempt to elude, allowing a swear to escape his lips. Konk hurtled for Ren's nape with the weapon but as he swerved and before the metal collided, Niddler swished down and grabbed the mark. Ioz boarded the ship and swatting with his tipping saber, plunked over two of Joat's three visitors and swiveled with might at the third. The opposite bandit's cutlass caught with him and Ioz fought by bravado to keep his sword stable. Ioz eventually hauled back, which invited the brigand to stroke the blade at him once more. When he did, Ioz rolled his assault to the blunt side of the steel. It caught with the man, which caused a crash overboard and into the water. "Nice day for a swim, eh, Joat?" Ioz focused on Joat as his new enemy and stepped toward him, tautly arrogant and drawn in hand. He prepared to defend ownership of the Wraith. Joat dashed to run for the starboard, a sly smile plastered on his face. Konk then proceeded to block his path.

"No. Nice day for Konk to get paid. Hahahahh!" The piglet groaned out a cruel and whooping laugh as he reeled his grody trident at the defending buccaneer. Behind him, Joat's hooligans had ambled up and started to skulk forward but they were crisply taken out by Ren, who ably whacked one of the scamps off-balance. Tula dealt the last of his standing scalawags a swift kick in the back, making the aggressor tumble to the floor. They tossed them both off the deck. Ioz swung with strength at the piglet's stubby and crude chopper and it shed, flying out of his hand. "Oh no." Konk simply muttered, staring with over-inflated eyes at the hand in which his weapon had flung from and then back at Ioz. Niddler hopped on the peg-legged menace, flapping wings and clawing at the head. The avian shouted angry squawks and chatters as the shrimp battled to free himself. It was over, finally. Except for Joat.

"Where did that kreld-eater run off to?" Ren exerted with storm on his brow. He steadied with his broken blade that was extended at-the-ready and searched around for any sign of the mule-face.

No sooner did the noble speak than the claw-handed villain jump out from behind the cabin with a bow in arm. "Right here, boy." Joat delivered with an evil laugh as he fired a spiked arrow in the direction of Ioz, it conjoined with an arm. "I hope you like Dartha-Nightmare-Eel venom with your Wraith, Ioz!" He expelled a spiteful howl and then using his metal incisor, hurdled overboard and swam to the rangier of Bloth's scout-ships that had drifted out to sea. Tula muzzled a gag as Ren's face converted to one of that both dazed and furious.

"Konk getting out of here." The stunned gimp twitched his eyes, he observed that the mongrel-salt had turned tail. He stumped to the edge of the platform. Hobbling off the boundary, he hit the sea with a splash. Ren and Tula let him go.

"Ioz!" Tula wailed with a panicked upset. She knelt down to him to stabilize, as he was closely on the ground. She flickered her blurring eyes to clear a static view.

Ioz felt sick, his head pounded and his vision continued to show specs. "That...jitatan...sea-scum." The wounded outlaw drew in enough dwindling health to choke out, breathing continued to diminish to an impairment.

"Ioz, don't try to move. We'll get you some help." Ren instructed him with a drastic urgency and a violent undertone that could have only come from wishes of ill-will intended for his chum's assaulter. He hunched down at Ioz's clammy shoulder, browsing at where the darts had implanted. "We have to get these out." The direful regent scrutinized with a traumatic worry. "Tula, get me something to wrap over it." He commanded his female comrade but when she didn't move fast enough, he slashed off a piece of fabric from his attire with his abrupt sword. Scrupulously, he tried to remove the stingers with his hand, but they wouldn't come out. Ioz kept moving. "Joiquiva, Lus-nayi!" The brave orphans compassionately answered the call at his summon.

"It's too late for me...go get that...kreld-eater." Ioz tenaciously swore, vigorously forcing his voice to do his will. He everything but collapsed on the deck, he began to hear abstruse sounds. His knees started to succumb to the weakness, his feet tapped in floundering motivation to stay upright. He staggered, and folded.

"Don't worry about him, Ioz. I promise we'll make him pay, you're too sick to move. Tula, help me get him to the cabin. He needs some water too, if it's anything like a naja-bite from the urchin-plagues of Octopon he'll be dehydrated." Ren led, beckoning to his able-bodied shipmate. His words were frank and severe. He tried to wipe away the orange toxin from the affected leak.

"It's not working!" Joiquiva grieved when she saw the paste made for the wound was being devoured by the flesh itself, she broke into a frustrated sob on her tireless legs as Lus-nayi brought more.

Niddler tentatively approached, letting out a muted squawk. "Is there anything I can do to help?" He timidly murmured with a distraught overture.

"Go away Niddler!" Ren yelled in frustration at the monkeybird who had picked the absolutely-worst possible time to say anything. He fathomed himself on the verge of losing his head. "I'm sorry, Niddler. Get some water, please." Ren flatly requested, realizing his flop.

"Sorry I asked..." Niddler sadly cawed off to do as Ren told him.

Tula assisted Ren in bracing Ioz, having not yet attempted to boost him off the ground. "Ren...I think I can help slow the poison with my ecomantic powers. It will take a lot out of me." The crewwoman melted into Ren's stare, gravely upset.

Ren begun to calm down. "We still need to get him inside." Ren stated after a terrified jolt of misery began to once again overthrow his nerve. He searched restlessly in his numb companion's eyes. "Wait...maybe, maybe the Treasure can help." The discouraged prince culled out the Treasure he managed to keep safe and circulated it over the stony-hindered colleague. It glowed as it started to transfer it's energy into the body it was coming in contact with. Ioz seemed to feel better, or at least relax. "I think it's helping." Ren's eyes perked up as the fiery emotion proceeded to leave him.

"Ren, I hate to interrupt, but we might need the Treasure for something else." Niddler meekly squeezed out as he tiptoed over to the captain. His fluffy primate-hand pointed to the dark water, already beginning to surround the ship.

"Scot pango!" Ren's expletive dreadfully hissed as he stood and quickly powered to the border of the craft. "You have to help me, Niddler." He rotated, addressing the precariously-frightened monkeybird. Ren felt slovenly, as if all the drive to fight had been about to leave him.

Tula rendered her hands over Ioz's head and leaned her front against her arms, reposing down to her knees as she accomplished her magic. "Stay with me..." Tula urged her ability, concentrating. Her zest began to fill him as his face began to regain it's former tone instead of the bleak paleness that had overtaken him. Ioz quieted and he appeared to have drifted off into a deep slumber, a slumber, but he was okay. Tula soon would lose all potency she had reserved. When she spoke, her words were lethargic. She felt and would barely manifest any might to lift her head, her limbs were sore. Her entire vitality drained, she ached.

Niddler helped to thrust the Treasure into the deadened sea, dispersing to cleanse it away. It was unfortunate that though it departed from the lone transport, only a compact patch disappeared. Dark water almost, if not entirely, concealed the seascape around them. Never before had so much of it been seen in the general area. "You'll have to clear a road for us, Niddler. I know you're tired, but we have to get Ioz to land." Ren commanded in a somber volume as he took the wheel. "We'll have to go to Jenna's, it's the nearest port from here by our status. Perhaps the only port we'll be able to find in time." He firmly dictated as he endured the spindle, but spiritlessly. Niddler could only submit a sympathetic look of hope.

Quite a while later when the sojourners had pulled into port with their stricken crewmate, nightfall cavorted in the darkened skies. Tula and Ren had transferred Ioz to the stall, Tula supported Ren with the tasks of steering as they exchanged shifts to check on his condition. They schlepped into the dock at the anterior harbor of the lighthouse. It had felt like a farflung memory since Ren had seen this place last. They greeted Jenna staidly, and bestowed her with the 9th Treasure, explaining about having to retain the 10th due to the uprise of the dark water...to which, she lifted a shocked eye to.

"I did not think it would be nearly this bad. Now I wonder if your father knew this would happen." Jenna studied the solemn adventurers as they sat in pithy room inside the lighthouse, through the windowpane dark water was in flux on the horizon. Ioz rested on a bed next to where they grounded. "Unfortunately I can't do anything for him other than slow the poison, all my medicinal herbs have been used up to treat the many ailments of the citizens of Octopon during the partial rebirth. It this were regular Dartha-Eel venin, I could help but this variety, Nightmare, is so uncommonly found and there are not as many antidotes. It's so rarely applied in combat and from what I know, beyond the composition of urchin-nettles. The potential is deadly with hysteria-inducing effects in higher amounts, I don't think many want to even touch it, and much less to use it. Because it has such a strong repel, even a Dreen will refuse to adhere to the infection." She stilled to digest her thoughts, keeping level. "Have you tried any other ports?" She pried of concern.

"This was the closest one to where we were, besides Kalinda." Ren informed the whole after a quietude, trying to push his emotions aside. He wrestled to collect his notions. "And those people are still getting back on their feet." He continued on in reflection, his voice toiled when he remembered what his friends had told him about the island. Surely, there would be no better fare.

His guardian stopped as to judge, Tula also lost herself under the circumstance. Niddler purely watched the tension, wearied in carriage. Finally, someone devised a word. "Ren, what about Miragon?" The night-tressed woman gently asked, edging on an idea. "We could go back, and get the Lo-ac flower. I have a feeling it may do us better than the chance we would take at other towns." She suggested with faith in her lucidity as the others drew attention to her.

"That is true. The flower is said to have magical healing properties, though it is all the way in Miragon. It would be a close chance to bet on and the fastest way would be over the canal. If you are able to slow the poison, it may be possible from my knowledge." Jenna collectedly offered, gandering up at them with a calm sympathy. Rain wept down from a display of alligned moons as the clouds set the heavens overcast.

"I know it works. It worked on Roulette. We'll go back to Miragon and find Roulette. I'm almost positive he's still there, and we'll find the flower. It may be Ioz's only chance." Ren at last declared intrepid words, hope began to creep into his ambiance. Ren did not have time to tell Jenna about all that had happened, though he was sure she accepted there were many things on his mind. He wanted to ask about the history of his family, but he couldn't. Not now. "Did a lone dagron-rider come here?" Ren at last posed his caregiver a question that continued to plague his mind, one he thought she may be able to give an answer to.

"A dagron-rider? I don't believe so, is it of importance?" Jenna wondered with an unusual surprise in her tone. It was not like Ren to ask things like this.

"She didn't?" Ren certainly adopted a befuddled state, Jazhea told him she would be going here before her capture. It was what he heard, or assumed he did.

"No. I'm sorry Ren, I don't know what you're talking about." His guardian relinquished in response, genuinely confused.

"Then I don't know what to think. We'll head out now, we need to get to Miragon as soon as possible. We can't afford to waste any time if Ioz is to make it through." Ren stood up with a last affirmation of resolve. He hugged Jenna as the six of them bolstered their sleeping friend back to the Wraith, holding with them the 10th Treasure of Rule.

Far off shore, waves crashed about in overcast waters beyond. The medium-sized ship tossed in the wind, the storm at sea twisted and thrashed vindictively. The cruel tempest would not let up.

"Hurry! Steady the mainstay!" The Captain of the galleon desperately strained to order her hysterical crew.

"This area has too many storms, Milady! We have to reach shore soon or we're finished for good!" The first-mate of the ship heralded, thoroughly dire.

"If only that were possible, Uley." Captain Taneuka muttered under her critical breath in such a manner no others could hear. She would hide her weakness for as long as her independence would allow. For the sake of herself, and her loyal crew. The waves clobbered against the hull. "We'll reach land, I swear on Kuunda's mighty sword we will! I will not let Her go down and none of you will either! By Daven's Mighty Blade!" The Captain of the Monsoon persisted in bold and foolish hubris. She craned to view her crew who faltered across the deck. She witnessed them doing everything they could to keep the creaking, and now cracking, main-mast from falling. They failed. She heard a terrifying rip. The topsail flopped to the floorboards below, leaving only the woven foot and clew remaining. The Monsoon careened as if it would overturn, rocking and beating against the tide. Taneuka wondered if this would be justice for all the times her penchant for hubris couldn't let her be taken down. "We can still try to catch a drift! We'll need to toss some-" Taneuka began to scheme up failing plans in her head. To her misfortune, her hopes were squashed as she was brought more horrid news.

"Capt' Taneuka! The orlop is filling with water! We can't contain it!" Tragically, one of the hands on Captain Taneuka's crew cried out.

Taneuka fought her natural responses, holding them back. Of course she would go down with the the Monsoon if it came to that, but she refused to let that inkling even touch her mind. She would not issue the order to abandon ship. She arched her head up at the enclosing sky, the towering enormity swallowed her and everyone with her. The waft of the asphyxiating and vulgar odor filled her nostrils. No more flouting. "By my kin's stolen Margar statue. No..." Taneuka shuddered one final protest before she would be overcome. Her eyes met only with bones. She saw black.

"Welcome aboard, dear. You're in good fortune that I happen to be feeling generous today. Hand over your gold and I might just let you live." The voice of the hefty captain of the Maelstrom greeted Captain Taneuka in the chamber enclosed by the maw. The she-captain goggled about with awe and dread, her and her crew were surrounded and situated on a stone stoop with marauders abound. The groaning wooden-carrier to the rear had not been tacked and drifted freely in the murky basin that was inside the oppressing ship. Rope lashed the hands of she and her deckhands, which were held in front of them. Them. Taneuka trembled with torment.

"We don't want any trouble, Captain Bloth." Captain Taneuka gravely upheld, the dank air around her smothered. She felt nervous fortitude swaying to a spasm within her.

"You've heard about me, have you?" Bloth chuckled a sporting laugh.

"Only intimately." Taneuka grimly muttered. Her blue eyes darted within the confines of the bony device.

"Ah, very well. Then you know I am a man of...business." Bloth's shrewd demeanor played coldly when he addressed the soon-to-be subject of his pillage.

"So we can make a bargain if you let us go?" Taneuka stood her ground in her defiant words, brawling with frailty for as long as capable. "You can't be happy to see us..." She chided on, the Pirate Lord's legion drafted her greatly outnumbered. She saw about fifty cutthroat bandits where he stood alone, not including ones at his disposal that lurked around every corner and stairway. Compared to her ten would not be good odds. The lank form at his right-hand side lingered in imposing on her a deploring, yet rousing, stare that made her blood curdle.

"Oh, but I am!" The evil Pirate Lord curled with a cloying air of pleasantry. "And perhaps we can make some sort of arrangement..." His emphasis tapered off in a congenial assessment. "You hand over your gold, I'll set you free, but if you don't or you comply inadequately, well, then I don't think I can be so accommodating, my sweet. Gold. And your hats, too." He laid out his terms out barbarously on the table.

"How much do you need? We will need some form of...aid when we hit the high seas. I suppose with eleven of us, quite a meal is to be had for your...beast." Taneuka humbly stalled, a heavy hole began to grow in the pit of her binding stomach. Worse yet, she imagined she had began to show her heart. She heard disastrous howls and jeers uproar from the army behind Bloth. With anxiety the bound lady-pirate with hair of blond sunset cast her glare down to her boots.

"How much do you think? Hand it all over!" Captain Bloth barked in callous demand. "Unless...you'd rather I feed you to my Constrictus!" He threatened then, but stopped. He pondered something and returned with a punishing gaze. "Would that punishment suit you, Sweetie? Or maybe, I'll let my second-in-command dispose of you..." He mulled over in consideration as lips of broad ice formed a distressing smile. "And your crew." He proposed in a detailed afterthought, tagged on at the very end of his proposition. Taneuka's encompassing glance flew and anchored upon the leggy and rotting figure grinning at her. Mantus spouted his blade, drawn in preparation.

"Do what he says!" Taneuka instantly shuddered out, puffy eyes jolted in terror.

"But Captain Taneuka, if we hand over our gold we'll be in trouble like sea-bums in a monsoon ourselves when we get outta here!" Taneuka's first-mate, Uley, made known his objection. The Monsoon was in horrific shape and even and if they were released, without live they would have no chance of recovery in the twenty seas.

"Bloth is a man of his word, now do it! Pronto!" Uncompromisingly, Taneuka boomed. Her heart did a back-flip.

"But, Lady!" uey vivaciously contended.

"Now! That's an official order!" Taneuka's sharp words were inexorable, ultimate severity laced her tone.

Many men of Taneuka's frigate came forward carrying two heavy trunks brimming with gold. Looters from Bloth's crew strode over to collect it.

"That's it. Two-thousand pieces. It's all there in stub and polish." Taneuka dejectedly murmured. She fumbled with her yoked hands, which were cut free as the opposing pirate-horde pushed her back to her vessel with pointed swords. She swooped her hat off her head on her abscond as the others alighted to the stairs. "We would have only fought a battle we could not win. He's what is Amiss-oh, and not a normal kind. He reeks of it." To Uley she stolidly respired.

"Begone with them! Close the intakes!" The cutthroat tyrant comman directed to his crew as the crank wound. Bloth himself threw down the switch to open the hatch with one arm. The splintering Monsoon dispersed soon after as bilge-water from the Maelstrom's sewage came gushing out. "They won't last long on that rickety bucket." Bloth commented while he rounded to glance at his commander, who seemed disappointed and yet pleased with the grand spoil. The sour and crooked-toothed jaw reformed into a smirk when Mantus's master tossed him a turgid portion of the pickings. "The rest of this should pay for some much-needed upgrades. Eh, Mantus?" The Pirate Lord expressed after shooting a knowing grin. He picked up the soft-feathered hat and placed it on his head. "Too small!" His final revelation grumbled before he digressed, the red-plumed hat soused and sinking in the spoliation of the Maelstrom's sludge.

On a massive ship floating due West of a shore known as the Beach of Doom, an eerie silence broke with only two voices in the dark.

"I thought we had made a deal. Why did you fail me?" Growled a malevolent inquirer to another entity being suspended at arm's length and over a profound cavity, exclusively concealed with shadow.

"Aye, he's a goner. Bloth never likes the Third-Moonrise." Some spectators gabbled within a rangy circle.

"I didn't! I took out that kreld-eating-smool-brained sea-scum, Ioz, right where he was vulnerable! He'll be belly up in less than a moonrise I swear by the seas of Mer!" The skinny lifeform pleaded, swallowing a lump in his throat as he dangled over the disgusting pit opened below him. He energetically tried to bargain with the source of the conviction. The horrible smell of death and some other stench that could not be named clambered out from the gurgling stew. Only disturbing noises from underneath shattered the enduring quiet.

"You will stop your ramblings, fool!" The mouth of the gravelly agitator shouted, he hulked a monumental degree over the secondary fellow. The slim character fell silent. "Joat, now I didn't ask you to simply kill them. I asked you to return the boy and his Treasure to me. We had agreed on a deal." The lordly reproach traveled on, talking as if his words were simple and very reasonable, certainly capable of being understood by the most sensible of men.

"I know that Bloth!" The lean body choked out with a panicked whimper. "Please give me some more time. I promise I'll get them and bring them all back. I'll get the Treasure, just give me a second chance!" The mule-headed Joat begged as he squirmed inside the big man's fist, being unable to escape the locked clutch or even swing himself anywhere.

Bloth chuckled a bold laugh. "I've already given you a second chance, Joat. You've failed me on both occasions. Unfortunately for you, it would be a waste to keep you...afloat again." Bloth roughly growled as he leered upon the vermin with a sick amusement. He lowered his hand, making the hook-claw dip further into the void.

"I'm sorry! It was a foolish mistake! I was a smool-brained darva-rat, but it won't happen again! One more chance I beg of you, Lord Bloth! Oh Supreme-Cruel-One, please just let me go!" The metal-handed swab groveled to the ogre, he gaped in horror at the chasm below him and the merciless captain before him with absolute fear. His eyes poked momentarily on a nearby seadog, seeking any counsel or solace in the possibility of forgiveness but Konk's inflated face shook horizontally. Then he dropped, deep into the abyss of the dark well. Above the hole could be heard a mash of horrible sounds and high-pitched screams.

Konk bore down into the black shaft. He listened to the revenge-hungry martyr that had unwillingly taken his place. He looked not in sadness, but in queer wonder. For the first time, there was a prolonged moment of silence that hung over the deck of the Maelstrom as the crewmen heard the mule-man squeal about something other than losing his ship for the very first time since he had been aboard. It was not until several moments later that the bloodthirsty boss drew back his unclenched hand, pausing only to pore down with smile and fleeting interest before he turned to walk away.

In a dark corner hidden portside of the deck of the same skeletal ship, a figure neared. Dull shadows cast over the hood of the cloak, which reached down to elevate a scroll from his foot. "This is where the Son of Primus has gone." The tinging voice filled the air. The coated figure met his strange eyes with a map scribbled with illegible writing. He curled one arm to ponder.


	8. Chapter 7

Chapter 7

In a dank room aboard a vessel, the morning light drizzled into focus. It became scarcely unable to penetrate a small-windowed cabin.

"Morpho, how am I to make that boy pay for humiliating me, if I don't know where he is?" The ruthless pirate captain of the ship growled as he scoured down at a world map where five large X's were marked, one of them had been scratched off.

The splice of man and creature who entered through the doorway to the asylum hissed. He approached the bulky figure who bent over the map as he monitored. "We can ineptly tell a relative location of the boy and where he might be heading." The mutant paused, making an erratic and throaty warble. "However, if he passes through any dark water and uses the Treasure, we can tell where he is." The unhuman sibilated subsequently, gazing at the map the gigantic captain cascaded over. He bent an eye at a nearby X and placed the tip of an appendage over and on the red mark. "This is gone now." The crimson X faded, becoming a black smear as he lifted his tentacle away from the thin paper of the map.

The pallid scoundrel slammed his fist on the table. "So he has the 10th Treasure of Rule!" The uprising voice of the brute anguished. "Blast his soul! May he fall into seas of abominable abyss!" The sharp administrator bitterly roared as he reviewed the chart.

"Hope is not lost, Bloth. We have a fix on his location. He last left the shores near the city of Octopon and he is making his way quickly North-West of there." Morpho's intelligence slithered like the snakes as he pointed a shriveled human hand at the crux of the lighthouse and trailed it farther up the map, out to deep waters. "The metal-claw said he poisoned one of the Son of Primus's crew, so it is only logical to assume they are traveling somewhere to help their sick companion and will not go after the Treasure now. In which case, we have time to watch, and wait." Morpho effected the explanation of his plan with a reptilian gurgle, allowing Bloth to barge in.

"If their friend is injured, then there's a greater chance for us to destroy them instantly and be done with it!" Bloth's inflection sprouted up in a shout as he manifested his disagreement with the disciple's concept, he wanted to take action now.

"No, Bloth. That would be a waste of resources." Morpho bid as he moved closer to the pilferer-warlord to squarely occupy sightline at him. "It is better for us to take our time. The Son of Primus will go to the next Treasure that is in within distance of the Compass of Rule. When we know where he is, we know where he will go." Morpho aptly concluded as Bloth's spurned temper subsided.

"How will we know where he goes?" The Pirate Lord inquired with a keen-witted constitution as he evaluated this for a moment. Morpho did have a point, but Bloth did not want to risk losing his location.

Morpho designed well arrangements slyly and confidently. "By gathering the jewels from their locations, the Son of Primus is awaking areas of Mer that were previously unaccessible to my master." The evil being gradually contrived, and suspended to hiss. "The Dark Dweller." He followed up, and began again. "Though the previous attempts at sealing the rift have been successful, my Master's power can reach anywhere the jewels are not and he can tell when places that were previously closed off become open. He can then spread his reach far and wide, for the Son of Primus. All the boy needs to do is use the Treasure for my master to become aware of his path." The disciple foretold, ending his scenario with a slimy rasp.

Bloth considered this, scratching his bearded chin as he set his study upon the disciple. It sounded like a fine plan, but he sensed something he could not lay his finger on about the zealot's words.

"There is one more thing, Bloth." Morpho abraded once more, peering at the inflated captain.

"What is it, Morpho?" Bloth questioned, his one human eye still downturned against the map.

"My Master has detected, a disturbance." Morpho edged on.

"A disturbance?" Bloth suspiciously warranted as he furrowed his brow, he bat the mutation a raised iris of goldenrod.

"Yes, it is not for sure." Morpho progressed an uncanny derivative. Bloth observed him, abated but concerned. "My Master believes the boy may have come into some...questionable abilities." Morpho slithered with a certain unscrupulousness and cunning.

The Pirate Lord narrowed his gaze in creeping doubt. "What kind, of abilities?" The blackguard asked, mistrust flooding into his gale.

"Our sources say a Treasure may have somehow become entwined with the boy, which could mean that he may have been given powers that could be difficult to vanquish." Morpho twisted out as he tarried to froth with a tricky whir. "My Master is not certain what these abilities may be." He arrested his counsel, leaving the pallor man to interpret this.

Bloth stood up. "In that case what do we do? What do you speak of Morpho? Get to the point!" The captain requisitioned with zeal, having entertained more than his fair tolerance of guessing games.

Morpho focused disturbingly on the duke of the waves. "We bait a trap, for the prince. We perform a...Test." Morpho hissed and gurgled, ending his sentence in a flustering air that would make even the bravest sailors of Mer uneasy in the gut.

Bloth enlivened an eyebrow and slumped a fist to his hip as he adjusted on the obsessed half-human, penetrating the dingamord fanatic with a glass speck and wondering what kind of lure this forsaken prankster could possibly scheme up. He would have explored further, but his ideas were skewered when he heard the door to his warroom creak open.

"Bloth, we need you on-" Bloth's commander, Mantus, began to draft a word but stopped when he saw Morpho in the room. He shot him a malevolent glare, to which the disciple returned with a maniacal stare and a seething malice inside an optic of a sea-creature. "Deck." Mantus veered his bald eyebrow and continued his broken sentence.

"What is it now, Mantus?" Bloth seemed to be irritated when he investigated his shenanigan and rounded away from Morpho, walking to the egress of his headquarters.

"We will continue our conversation about the Son of Primus soon." Morpho imparted one cold-blooded spew and the precarious marauder simply turned to leer at him in response as he stepped out the door. Mantus only coldly slanted blue rings and continued onward, pressing his boss out of the room.

The sun rose high in the sky as a speeding craft durably tilled it's lane across a sea of waters otherwise clear if not dabbled with patches of black.

"Niddler, we just need a little more open sea starboardside. Full sail, Tula." Ren shouted to his monkeybird-buddy from the helm of the Wraith.

"I'm trying!" Niddler let out with a determined caw. He hovered off the starboard of the Wraith with the Treasure in paw, trying not to fumble it. He almost failed his objective in antecedent attempts and with bad consequence, but he needed to be brave. He probed the violet spiral-Treasure into the muck of ink at the margin of the ship, it started to fizz and bubble. "Starboard is clear Ren!" He announced a recovery.

"We have sail!" Tula hollered back to Ren, as he cranked the wheel to catch the wind. The Wraith creaked with the breeze as it pulled around.

Lus-nayi leaned her palm to the mast. Though she never interacted in the direct way of her younger sister, even in her home-language she found herself everything silent to the chirping of sea-birds. The Quin orphans had proven useful in sounding the alarm for danger when one or two of the Wraith's crew were off-duty.

"It shouldn't be much farther to Miragon, provided we can keep this dark water at bay." Ren asserted with steadfast absorption as he plowed the vessel through the partially smooth waters, his blond hair whipping against the hem of his neck. He tunneled his mind on achieving the island, he did not know how long Ioz would have before the poison would overtake him, but he could not risk finding out. Tula sprung back to his side at the driving spokes, a groan echoed from the cabin. Ren flashed his head around to inspect.

"Ay chunga lunga. It's Ioz, he must be stirring!" Tula hectically flit into the cabin to check on the ill mate, Ren couldn't leave his post.

"Where...am I? Woman?" Ioz's hoarse stammer dribbled, barely striving to communicate as he blundered to settle a grasp on his surroundings.

"You're on the Wraith, Ioz. You're safe. You're sick and we're going to Miragon so we can get the Lo-ac flower to save you." Tula's devotion powered as she tried to explain to him the emergency as calmly as she could.

"Ren!" The pirate started to say, as if he was disconcerted by an existence.

"He's fine. Everyone is here and safe." Tula wearily reassured him, immensely tired and disheartened she was.

"Who? Who was...chungo lungo." Ioz tussled to mouth, as if he felt hurt or troubled breathing. His right hand reached for an empty void, trying to gather the sword that wasn't with him. He flailed his palm around with alarm, his black pupils were ominous dots.

"It was Joat. He's not here now, don't worry. Everyone is here. We're getting you to Miragon to find the Lo-ac plant so you can use it to recover." The ceaseless woman tried to express to him as clearly as able. Her soothing but saddened volume lingered, and began to crack.

"Woman..." He slightly opened his eyes and began to whisper something, but then he fell flat as if he drifted off to sleep again. Tula sedately traipsed back out.

"How is he?" Ren asked her with constrained unease.

"It seems like he doesn't know where he is. He kept asking me about what happened, but he's out again." Tula updated the prince in a solid but tormented rhythm.

"Ay chunga." Ren's brow dimmed, he was feeling impediment. "We'll get to Miragon soon." Ren forced his eyes ahead, staring supremely and fazing out into the overlaying outstretch of sea with an immovable drive.

"I hope so, I haven't had a good meal in ages." Niddler groaned as his empty stomach grumbled. He rested off the deck of the Wraith as he hoisted his abdomen. He glanced at the Treasure when it suddenly started blinking a pure light. His flurried white eyebrows arose in bewildered agitation. "Ren! I think there's something wrong with this Treasure!" He shouted to the dry noble at the wheel.

"What Niddler? I can't hear you very well from down there!" Ren called out in return, albeit disquieted. Then he noticed it too. "The Treasure? What's it doing? Tula, take the wheel!" He commanded his shipmate as he trampled down to where Niddler perched. "By Kuunda..." He breathed out with stupefaction as he admired the astounding antique, eyes of the sky lit up with marvel. "I wonder why it's doing that, could it be...telling us something?" The prince whispered as he desisted and inspected. "Yes, I think that's what it's doing! It's trying to tell us something, Niddler." Aloud he reaffirmed. He clipped out the Treasure at arms' length to the anterior abroad as it pointed to a line of clarion sea. "Tula, make for starboard!" He beckoned to Tula's frame above at the wheelhouse and she engineered the helm as he determined. Optimistically, they hit pristine water for an accelerating length of time. The newly accessible path did not require any wild steering or cleansing of dark water.

"Didn't the Guardian of the Treasure call it the Treasure of the Wise? Maybe it has more powers than we thought it did." Niddler theorized with a witty inflection.

"You know I think you might be right, Niddler." Ren agreed with a happy smile. He cupped the Treasure to face the sea, shimmering and bright. He dashed around the schooner, searching for places it would blink. It always glowed where there were wide expanses the dark water wouldn't cover. However, Ren's joy began to wash away with the tide as he thought about Ioz and Ioz's condition. "How far are we from land, Tula?" He sought of his companion who annexed a handle at the wheel.

"It looks like we won't be there until sunset, Ren!" The gem-eyed woman hollered back to him as he again tousled with his anxiety.

"Port, Tula!" Ren directed a call for change. "Tula...?" When the hanging lids of the enchantress speckled and closed the prince then knew the poor ecomancer must have been draining so much of his life spirit to keep their friend going, though she was nearing the limit being able to readily move herself. Tula had accomplished the assignment beneath her pale grip, with a groan the axis yielded to her disposal. He fortified the jewel steadily at the proceeding sea, it flicked in the direction the ship maneuvered. It continued to sail smoothly until the noise of a thud swallowed Ren's ears. "What was that?" The long-haired skipper wondered and spun around, scouting for the influence of the bang. It sounded like something had hit the Wraith!

"Ren, there's something wrong with the rudder!" Tula reported from proximity. She spun the spindle at the helm but instead of it granting some form of resistance, it only rolled in an endless cycle. The wind was blowing them in reverse.

"Noy jitat." Ren bluntly uttered. Why now of all times? "Where's the repair kit?" He collected his impulses, understanding that it was better to stop wasting time fretting about the problem and instead find a solution.

"It should be just over the forepeak. You'll have to correct it manually, there's no where for us to stop out here." Tula acknowledged as she reposed.

"Good, stay there!" Under an austere aura Ren gathered his determination with the one directive he asked for. Tula obliged as he shimmied down the stern and waist-deep into the temperate ocean. Between his torso and a brawny arm he balanced a ratchetbox. He waded over to the compartment that enclosed the tail. With his hand, he gently motioned the rudder back and forth. "Aha. Not too bad." He declared, coming to a progressive conclusion. Out of the inside of the ditty, he removed a screwdriver and a spare panel to attach to the chain where the pin had broken off starboardside. It was a simple enough fix so he set the glowfish lantern onto a shelf and began to undergo the concise procedure to rivet the links. He pressed back the blade to hold it into place and made a deft adjustment. He then heard a voice. The woman must have been close.

"Noy borga! Watch where you're going!" The disgruntled female appeared to be under the rudder on portside. It sounded as if she fought off a pain. Strangely, it was a familiar impingement to Ren.

"Where are you? I can't see you!" The blond sailor shouted out tensely as he tried to place where she was coming from.

"Over here!" The answer bunged with curtailed reply as Ren rushed around to it's source. Ren looked into a crevice behind the stern of the Wraith, a girl was scrunched into a rounded sit.

"There you are!" The blue-eyed prince established his ambition before marking at her face. "Solia?! It's you! How?" Ren reacted in astonishment as he saw the shape of Ioz's younger sister nestled away in the concealed den, she rubbed a hand over her forehead. His mouth formed a distended circle, he hurried to climb above and throw her a rope to pull her aboard as soon as his eyes weighed on her.

"Chunga lunga." Solia moaned as she rubbed the top of her scalp. "Pull me up and I'll explain everything." She conveyed at last to the spry man standing above her on the ship.

Ren flung her the rope and Solia climbed up onto the deck. She appeared to have bumped her head by some direct consequence of colliding with the Wraith and washing in the waves. He took her to the front of the ship where he gave her a towel to dry herself. Tula shot her a distressed glare.

"What is she, doing here?" The ecomancer clamored out with startled simmer from the controls, she could not soundly hide her brooding jealousy toward the emotional rival.

"Small ocean?" Solia astutely laughed. "I see you're still keeping Ren healthy, aren't you, Tula? Ren here pulled me out of the water and saved me. Thank you so much, my handsome prince. It's so nice to see you again." Solia addressed to the pink-clad competitor in a certain flaunting and snide charm as she hugged Ren a little too closely and gifted him a quick and affectionate peck on the cheek. Tula quietly fumed.

Ren quaked away, nervous and shy. "Uh. Why don't you sit down, Solia." The attractive prince stuttered.

The time until sundown was spent talking about how Solia had come to find them, and also about her brother's unfortunate accident. The Merrian sun glowed majestic orange as blue began to cast in in the sky, giving the Wraith a warm and fading splendor. All sat chatting on the deck as Tula drove on to Miragon in the evening light. Ren and Solia adjusted their barrels, Niddler perched on a keg adjacent to Ren.

"After that leviathan-sized wave, I was caught up in the storm and thrown out to sea. For the following weeks I struggled to hang on, then I had come upon a ship that was making it's way to Janda so I jumped aboard. I hoped to be able to find better fare there. It was there that I came upon someone from home in Tayhoj who had informed me that mother went missing but had died upon her return. She left us a reasonable sum of what she owned so I set sail to find brother. Even though he probably doesn't deserve it, noy borga." Solia narrated in detail of her adventure. "I didn't know where he would be so I made my way back to Kalinda with a boat I took in port, but when I did I found out that Bloth sea-hog had torched Kalinda to cinders and ay jitata, his ship was still there so I made to follow it. I was doing fine until I hit rough waters and I almost became lost to the dark water. It took my ship. I've been treading awash for about a moonrise now, far out to sea. I was beginning to lose hope, then I saw yours and swam toward it. You're too rough with your steering." She complained lightly as she smiled and consoled her head.

"If you don't like it, maybe you should go back home." Tula bitterly flout. She glowered, half-heartedly annoyed. She didn't perpetuate in her ire and diverged to the more serious subject at hand. "Your brother is..." She hesitated, contending with pain. "Not well." She informed their visitor. Niddler whimpered, unsettled as he peered sympathetically at the other woman.

"Noy borga! Really? If that's the case, I feel terrible. I should have tried to find him sooner. Chunga lunga. What's wrong with him?" Solia flared up with worry. Even though she possessed a tough spirit in her much like her brother's, she found grief in the news.

"He was shot by poison darts from one of Bloth's wretched goons, Joat, who tried to take the Wraith back from us." Tula illustrated while she slouched, a poignant anger presided in her dialect.

"By the twin moons! That's terrible! What has big brother gotten himself into now, I wish I was here earlier. Where is he now?" The worried and slightly affright little-sister asked, beaming up at them both.

"It's not your fault, Solia. You didn't have anything to do with what happened to him." Ren serenely assured her. "Ioz is here but he's barely hanging on. Only Tula's ecomantic abilities have been able to do him any good in slowing the poison." He paused as he transferred his eyes to Tula, who evidently could not help unfurling a proud smile even though she stayed bleak. "We're headed to Miragon to get the Lo-ac flower, which may be the only thing capable of saving him. We are far away from any towns that could have what we need. We've been traveling for a long time but it should not be much longer until we arrive." Ren completed his statement with clarity, detailing the situation.

Solia's dark eyes dropped to the floor as she started to take this in. "Can I please see him, Ren?" The sibling requested, quietly and tenderly peeking up.

Ren led the younger-sister to the quarters where the sick pirate was laid out. Ioz must have managed to pull the sheets away because he was sprawling in loose clothes and he seemed to be sweltering from fever as grains of sweat lined his head. He strayed a hand close to his temple and was muttering something inaudibly. "Noy borga!" Solia cursed in heartache of the terrible sight, she distraughtly knelt at her brother's side. She tried to talk with him, he was out and only seemed to be competent for mumbling words or phrases, presumably from dreams or nightmares. It sounded more like a nightmare.

"You can stay here as long as you like." Ren told her kindly but sturdily. "I have to relieve Tula of her duty and keep watch over the Wraith." The youthful paragon left and Solia did not follow, staying by the bedside. Not long after, Tula came in, at first discreetly and cautiously and then she too went to the man's cot abruptly.

"Noy jitat! He's getting worse." The ecomancer near-screamed in an agitated stifle after seeing Ioz with fever. "Try to fight it, please!" Tula cried as she slumped down and directed her energy, her hands laboriously laid on Ioz's right arm. She drew in her power, experiencing it fluctuating through and out of her. She writhed to give him a jolt of stamina to fight against the poison. She squealed out in agony as she felt her essence drain. She began to fall weak and eventually came up from her enchantment stance. She garnered her breath, wheezing as she inhaled traumatically. Solia just watched, she saw her brother who seemed to be something of relieved of the ill-effects of his sickness and respired easier in a numbed state of rest. "That should keep him going for a little while." The reduced ecomancer released within a listless voice.

Solia's snarky rivalry toward the ecomancer had vanished, albeit temporarily as she witnessed with abashed amazement. "I've never seen anyone do that before." Solia demurely confessed as she stared at the capable woman next to her.

"I can't do it a lot." Tula softly murmured, glinting at Solia with sleepy eyes. "It takes a lot out of me. I can will anything that thrives on living energy." She described in a partially resting state, her head throbbed and she tried her best to discount the dull ache. "I'm going to rest." She carefully hummed. "I'll see you in the morning." Tula whispered her last phrase and clambered up to leave the room as Solia was about to say anything.

"Thank you!" Solia shouted above an undertone, right as Tula closed the door.

The twin moons of Mer still played in the sky as Ren and Tula took turns steering throughout the evening. Miragon was a lot farther away than the travelers' wishful thinking had hoped for but as the rosy-orange haze of dawn began to creep over the horizon, a substantial wall of thick sediment presented before them. Ren stretched at the wheel. He tired from his second shift for the night, running on little rest. He rocked the pulling vessel to where he hoped he would find a blast tunnel, which would be the quickest route to the tiny island.

"I think I see one up ahead!" Niddler reported as he flew back from the lead of the bateau. He found a cavity in the barrier on the outskirts of the haven.

"Is there wind?" Ren hollered back. For as far as he could tell it started to feel breezy. His hair blew spiritedly in his eyes, temporarily obstructing his vision.

"I can't see inside, but I think so!" Niddler called out in illumination, swerving to a leisure on the platform where Ren continued to drive on.

"Then we'll make for that tunnel!" Ren answered by fronting the Wraith into the devouring tunnel up ahead which would act like a chute.

When Solia awoke, she saw her ill brother resting. She had crashed on the floor of the cabin, plainly fallen asleep. She heard Ioz muttering some broken phrases and after asking if he was okay, realized he had fallen out of it again. She bent in worry to the window where a narrow strip of red light had begun spilling through. She opened the door to go out to the wobbling maindeck as it faded verily dim. "Ay chunga! Who turned out the lights?" She yelled out as she scrabbled through the dark. The great wind oppressed, threatening to shove her off her feet with it's velocity. Nigh of hearing her answer, daybreak started to return and focalize around her. She saw the murky waters of the marsh reflecting the vermilion and corral incandescence of morning on the skies surrounding Miragon. In the midst of the suffuse floated the foggy island of morass foliage. "Amazing..." She revered as she trot slowly out to the imbued floor of the central terrace.

"We're here, Solia. In Miragon." Ren welcomed Solia warmly, he dazzled a golden head to the jet-complexioned passenger as she tread forward and he gave her a smile. He whipped back into focus. "Now we just need to find Roulette, he'll know where the Lo-ac flower is." Ren led slowly through the moat, pulling closer to the small reserve. Tula had awaken a time ago and now tugged on the rope to trim the sails, curbing the Wraith as it clasped the land.

"I've never seen anything so..." Solia bide with words, browsing above at the tropical trees overhead with fascination. She admired the oddly shaped plants and wildlife. "Dense." Only a few more moments after she became lost in her headtrip, the ship sealed at shore.

The brightly-winged primate on deck who drew her attention paraded past her. "Finally! Maybe now I can actually get something to eat!" Niddler chattered by on monkeybird feet in anxious relief.

Ren busied himself with tying down the envoy and gathering supplies for the expedition. Solia offered to help, but she was told none was needed. "We can't leave Ioz on the ship like this alone. Someone will have to stay here or we'll need to find a smaller boat we can travel on." Tula logicalized, primarily directed at Ren as she prepared necessities for Ioz's aid, whom even with the combined help from three of them was not very portable.

"You're right, but I planned to call for Roulette to see if he knows where there's one we can find. We can't afford to waste one second." Ren coherently acknowledged, he slung a bag over his shoulder. The explorers would be fortunate Miragon's minimal stretch of land conducted well to sound and Roulette bolstered a good hearing because otherwise, he would have continued on sleeping. He did not dally to recognize the three voices beckoning him from the bay, he never forgot anyone.

"Roulette!" Ren loudly called for an extent of time, his hands cupped over the sides of his mouth to enunciate. He proceeded, not hearing any sign.

"Maybe we should just go look for him." Solia warily suggested, gawking at the fastened ship behind her. She revolved to gander at her friends who focused on a yellow-green dot making its way closer to them until it grew in size and magnified, morphing into a petite mammal with fluffy-feathered wings. It skimmed, progressively forthcoming until it arrested in headway.

"Roulette!" Ren shouted with a joyous familiarity. The creature known as Roulette hovered nearer.

"Well if it isn't my favorite traveling chums!" Roulette gibbered, greeting them. He frenzied around the group from the air. "What bring you to Miragon, doolies? Are you still looking for those Treasures?" Roulette jested in question, pleasantly surprised by the visit of old friends.

"Actually Roulette, we think you might be able to help us. We're in need of the Lo-ac plant. One of our friends is very sick." Ren regrettably disclosed, static to the floating sprite.

"Oh Really? Who? Wait, there's someone missing. Is it the pirate guy?" Roulette quizzically asked, Ren nodded affirmatively in answer. "Wait, who's this sea-leech?" With his knitted brow Roulette probed, he lingered over and fluttered in interested custom around the mocking Solia.

"Your worst nightmare, skyrat." Solia jeered, she performed an obvious endeavor to look scary.

"This is Solia, she's Ioz's sister." Ren gave Roulette the introductory. He awkwardly shifted his beryl stare to the immature woman beside him.

"Oh! Uh, right. Sorry to hear about your friend." Roulette perused them sympathetically. "I can find you the flower but we'll need a less haughty canoe to get ya there." Roulette truthfully stated, levitating contiguous.

"That's what we figured." Tula agreed with an approving hunch, shrugging with one arm. "We can't leave Ioz behind, so it will have to be close otherwise we'll have to follow you on water." The ecomancer dictated as she peered at Ren, who grinned and nodded with concurrence. The unfortunate healer let out a hacking cough as if Ioz's ailment was transfering to her all over, Tula had been aware for some time that she was overdoing her vitality out of sheer compassion.

"Tula...you don't look well. I really hope the flower does the trick this time, we can't put the Quest in jeopardy for Ioz. I care about him but, Tula...you have to understand I won't let Bloth take another life from this crew." Ren asserted his vigilance to perserve Tula's health, no matter what. She was fit enough to stand but internally Tula felt like she could die, as if the strength of her body was divided into thirteen pieces by itself. The Andorian femme wished not to rouse on what this detour would amount to, should those deeds come to that.

"Well in that case, I think I can get you one at Slaggon's old place. I owe you a favor anyways..." Roulette instructed and then recessed, possibly because he did not like his old captor's name brought to the stage. He cleaved on with conviction. "It's a ways in from here though so you'll have to travel on land and one of you will have to stay at the ship until they come back." Roulette said his proposal and awaited an assent.

"That's fine. Solia, will you be okay staying here?" Ren addressed to the sister of his dear colleague. He scouted her as she submit him a dreary expression, her musings perhaps being discontinued.

"Huh? Oh! Sure, I can handle things by myself just fine." Solia shook out, she confidently reassured the dashing prince. Under her meek truth, she worried.

"Right. Then we'll return soon." Ren promptly energized with an entrusting word. He gestured a goodbye nod to her as he trekked off with Tula and Niddler into the ample forest, following Roulette. Solia watched them turn and walk away. She went to check on her brother.

"Solia..." The groaning voice behind Solia blurted anemically, she whirled around.

"Huh? Oh, big brother! By Kuunda you're awake!" Solia playfully greeted him with a upbeat smile. She saw her sibling's eyes flicker open. Only narrow slits, but still active.

"Tell mother..." Ioz dribbled just lightly, as if he gripped for the right words to get out. He beheld Solia deeply, certainly distinguishing her.

Solia's heart did a jump. She didn't want to tell him the news, especially not in the condition he was in. "Brother, are you okay? Maybe you should get some more rest." Solia suggested to him, something else about the way he talked started to twinge at her. She felt an uncanny dolor.

"I didn't do enough...but I couldn't stay. No revenge-there was another reason...sister. There is a no-man who is chasing you...trying to cause you harm, he'll hunt you down...won't rest until you're broken...because he is envious of what I have-you don't underst-Noy ji..." Ioz determined to choke out in a delirious imperative, much like a skirmish with an unknown phantasm concealing his throat. His eyes did another revolution and then they closed and he floated out once more.

"You're delusional still...you told me why you left home! Envious of what, Ioz, that you took what was left of our father's inheritance to buy a sword to stab through Bloth's black-heart!? You told me that yourself, while leaving our now washed-off mother and I to pay for our home. Oh, brother. Brother?" Solia cried out in disquiet, looking close at his face. "You know I don't work well in taverns, how dare you leave me for good!" Solia rubbed her sobs into her sleeve. She jolted with a strange noise from outside and she scampered out of the cabin. She searched about at her surroundings and in the distance, noticed a patch of dark water. "Chunga lunga..." She swore in panic, observing the Wraith still anchored to the shore. Her head cracked back again as she picked up an irregular bubbling and a sound quaking from the spot. When she examined it closer, she saw a face. "Noy borga..." She touched the phrase to her lips, pupils pounding for the location Ren and Tula had evaporated into the jungle.

Ren and Tula were weaving their way back to the transport by a spindly boat found at Slaggon's abandoned manor. On the return trip, Niddler attained something juicy to eat from possibly the only fruit-bearing tree existing on the island. The monkeybird kept along with him some berries as well, he chomped down on his lunch in unabated ecstasy, as he did not enjoy the pleasure of a full stomach for many moonrises.

"It's a good thing Slaggon didn't come back to clear out his things from wherever he went." Calmly and soberly Ren commented while rowing the pithy vehicle back to the Wraith. "Roulette, you didn't mention before you knew any lore about the Treasures of Rule." Ren stated as he cocked a glance to the flying creation on the small rowboat.

"Well, I don't exactly know for sure." Roulette timidly edged out. His surroundings were all too familiar to him and it made him uneasy. "It's just a legend I heard, from a passerby way back when." He gingerly clarified, he exacted to pry eyes around through the lush leaves for any omen of doom or stirring trouble. "Without the Healing element, it causes a blockade to the energy." Roulette squeaked and flashed his eyes from his seat next to munching and messy Niddler. He couldn't dodge a seed from flinging to rest on his head, he grimaced at the sloppy monkeybird. "Here. There's something he left behind. Said it was from his homeland. He was a nice enough guy, a little uptight though, and he made a quick exit. I was assigned to lead him to some secret ecomancer's cove as his guide and I think he intended to use this weird thing here, but I turned away for one moment and heard him yelling. Then he was gone." Roulette skipped away momentarily, then yielding an object to Ren's possession.

"You don't know what it is at all?" Ren meaningfully desired. He read from a scrawled and broken rune that appeared to read a single word, Rand.

"Sorry Ren." Roulette shrugged a straight and disappointing response.

"At least we're still making headway. If we can keep together, I know we'll be able to discover the secrets of the Treasures. All the ones my father hid and those still out there." Ren pushed on, he focused his hard watch ever forward. He swept a muscled row into the muddy water, careening the paddle through heated bog.

"But until we can get the Lo-ac flower to Ioz we're going to need to be careful." The guarded ecomancer calculated as she beat her eyes about the surrounding jungle, she felt something move internally. Only a few moments after she had spoken, she did hear a squeal. "Ay jitata!" Tula cried out, uprising.

"Solia!" Ren roared out, his chest triggered a thump. He industriously started rowing the boat toward the Wraith, which wouldn't be a grand distance farther. The paddle bumped. Ren hastily stripped it from the offending rock. Niddler shot up from his nibbling with a glaze, wondering what had happened. Roulette aviated brusquely and close behind with sabotaged eyes. Ren crushed his way through the swampy marshway, paddling as fast as able. After a while his constitution started to falter with ache, but he kept on. He almost made it. The brook was gradually filling with an upsurge. The royal turned his neck to a budding dome of swamp water that was forming a grandiose bubble. He screamed as the concoction burst and from out of it projected an overshadowing ark. The grayness made by it's size cloaked the adventurers' rented boat, twin yellow-peepers on the fender of it's towering bow prospected a new prey. Two hulls knocked as a tiny gator was launched from the mock-ship's bridge.

"Look into my eyes! Trust me!" Ahead of Ren's compromised voyage, a counsel flew. "Don't give it power, it knows he is coming!" From a stillness on the bank the mysterious man urged the tremulous skiff-sitter. Solia followed the advice, her last resort sliding away from her.

"Noy jitat! What by the shadow moon-! I think I've been out to sea-too long!" Ren blasted profanities into the impinging wind, feeling a heaving turmoil suppress his lungs. He batted the oar into the shower of trying lizards that were dashing at him like projectiles from the ark-creation's cannons.

"Not so much! I see them too! What a strange creature, it looks like a real ship!" Tula tapped into the fray with the stir of sable hair. She read a pulse from the enemy as if she could catch a fix on the dynamic barge. The eyes like the dagrons glared at a lesser watercraft, continually flinging gator-bolts from it's terrace.

"Slaggon ruined so much of Miragon with his experiments! To that brackish pond up ahead if you want to reach your friend in time!" Roulette quavered as he encouraged the keel to slosh away.

"No-!" Ren yelped. One of the springing reptiles from the pseudo deck had bitten his arm, but it did not cease his momentum as he watched the vermin-launching creature row itself away. He tottered to the burgundy ship and withdrew his breath. Tula and Niddler hurdled out, Roulette keeping immediate.

Solia backed up behind the quarters off the stern, gaping petrified at the ripple in her vision. Her heart drummed fast but regulated at the retreating danger. She placed her hand over her chest. She heard her name called and whirled around. "Ren! Ay chunga, you're back!" In exasperation she hollered far.

Ren and Tula were sallying their way back on the vessel with Niddler and Roulette lagging close in tail. "What happened?" Ren tremored out. He grasped his hand over his torso, fending to wangle air as well. His blue eyes surfaced, shocked with adrenaline.

"Noy borga...the water!" Solia pointed out into the distance at a near and clear region of blue. Ren squinted and detected only a receding and black crescent of a line in the water, so akin to invisible...it could have been a mirage. Solia quivered, tremendously frightened.

Ren coughed and caught his breath, not greatly commenting on what she had seen. "We have our ship. Let's get Ioz." He firmly impelled, he and the others lumbered to the berth to carry out the man into the rangy but cramped canoe.

"Who are you?" When Tula finished securing her comrade into the narrow ferry, she noticed another visitor dropping a palm.

"Kauldron. I saw your friend was in trouble, so I asked her to trust me by looking into my eyes so I could perform my magic and grant her wish." The assistant strode forward for a pleasant introduction. "Do you need help out here? I can send signal flares if need be, I used to perform for one of the great princes of Mer when one of his ships needed rescue." Kauldron charmingly drove his fingertips to the zenith, an illusion of fire burbled in a controlled sparkle.

"Thank you. However, it's not rescue we need but the Lo-ac flower to heal our friend, and it only grows on Miragon." Ren sustained his polite denial, though unluckily grieved about Ioz lying on the blanket.

"Then I'll be going now, unless any of you happen to know where the exit from these islands are." The observer expectantly swiveled his plaited head.

"Miragon is the only island I've ever seen. Also, you need to go Southbound if you want out...through the swamps that fork into the Delta on your right." Roulette swept over with arms crossed to give proper directions.

"What brings you here?" The straggler had only desired to thank the fluffy helper and leave before the protective empath attempted a unlikely place of his presence. Tula flickered grassy eyes. Half-Andorian in the least, a robed shaman with shaded hair pivoted at her desire for his attention.

"Oh, I'm looking for my domestic. I believed she may have come to Miragon due to the roots of the life-giving Viva Tree being accessible from a hidden spot with the right key. The roots of the Viva Tree are favored for ecomancers who wish to use the runes here and are able to bend all elements, especially ones of supreme status. I suppose you've mistaken me for one you seek, people from Andorus have similar characteristics to people from here. Once when I was expelled from my home tribe on the island of Delpha by my envious sister, I was forced to take residence on Andorus." Kauldron's ebony braids hung off the peak of his scalp as he spun from his retreat.

"Domestic?" Ren raised his curiosity.

"Yes, I am looking for my wife here, Supreme Ecomancer Sugii. I'm sure you've heard of her. Or possibly her daughter." Kauldron nodded but pervaded in his watch of the heroes, who were no more enlightened.

"We have not. Ahh, I don't think those lizard-slimes did any damage, but my arm still feels terrible." The confused boy squeezed his arm to his trunk to console it, though the burn hadn't left his skin. Tula fluidly rushed to his care.

"Ah, I think I know what you may have been hit by, the Arc of Octet. Violent spirits that masquerade as ships, they're often accompanied by the Wiperdyles. Such creatures force their victims to forget one important memory with a bite." The knowledgeable foreigner speculated.

"I don't have any memories I can afford to lose. We are on an urgent mission to help our injured friend and the Quest we are on to save Mer is of the gravest importance. What can we do?" Ren stood briskly from the recent locate by the down-and-out travelmate, foraging for a clue.

"Hope what it made you forget wasn't important." Kauldron shrugged to misfortune and spasm.

"Thirteen Treasures of ancient time, Thirteen lessons of Rule in rhyme. To find the jewels in secret places, Follow where the Compass faces. If returned from the shore beyond, A new day dawns for Octopon. But if they fall into evil hands, Darkness descends on all the lands. For these riches two shall vie, In the realm of Dark Water where the Treasures lie." Ren calmly recited the poem to himself, in all surety he hadn't forgotten.

"Thirteen Treasures of ancient time, Thirteen lessons of Rule in rhyme. To find the jewels in secret places, Follow where the Compass faces. If returned from the shore beyond, A new day dawns for Octopon. But if they fall into evil hands, Darkness descends on all the lands. For these riches two shall vie, In the realm of Dark Water where the Treasures lie. On the day of the Black Sun this endless Storm will be known, then will the Wish of the Third King be grown." The well-dressed expert occurred to address his interpretation. "You missed a line, lad." Kauldron bizarrely added, but Ren didn't remember the final verse.

"Please tell me, there must be some way we can find out what it stole. I am Ren, Son of-" Ren began to inflect, stroking his arm to a dull easement. The pain had dissolved, but he would have bore it eight-fold if it meant being able to retrieve what was lost.

"The tide is rising! My ship will be washed away without anchor so I must go and you must help your crewmate, but I'm sure we will meet again." Kauldron made a deadbeat sprint, not stopping for any consequence. Yet, Miragon's current was always on an altitude above hazardous sea-level rises as Roulette strangely noted.

"How far is the flower? He's not looking well." Solia abode as she slipped a pillow under her brother's head, peering at his eyes, which were beginning to take on a jaundiced quality.

"It's not too far from here, just around the bend and a ways inward traveling by water." Roulette answered her, persistently shaken with coldness. The edge they suffered to fight to go back to the Wraith hadn't subsided. They pooled their way down the outskirts of the island. They passed the lush and dense forest jungles. Exotic flowers and birds. Trees and plants, a variety of noises animated from all around. The boat cruised around the crux of the waterway. "We should take my way around. We're less likely to encounter the mud-dwellers that way." Roulette led as he detoured the way, sitting on the small bow. The air of worriment mounted as they pushed forward. Tula and Ren navigated as Solia and Niddler resided to the rear where Ioz was nestled. The silence shrouded throughout the whole trip, with the exception of when Roulette called a turn of direction.

"You'll need to take a left to steer clear of the Galquin. Sometimes it goes into deeper waters when it's searching for prey." Roulette fluttered over to the portside as he dictated. Tula glided a push with her oar.

"How much farther is it, Roulette?" The blond teen sought as he shoved on, but then halted. "I think I hear something. Noy jitat!" He yelled out in alarm as in less than a moment, a silver flare began ripping at his chest. He appallingly screamed. "It's trying to steal the Compass!" The prince outcried terribly and tried to fight the origin of the distress away, but all he saw were wings going so fast that his vision compressed. He felt something sting, it almost pricked like metal.

"It's that wretched favorite pet of Slaggon's! Quick, whack it with the paddle!" With stimulated distress Roulette frantically goad the two.

"Noy jitat!" The youngest woman shouted as she lifted her oar and slammed the sterling blur with a flip. It landed contact and the Hawk-Knife plummeted into the slough and then briefly flew off. Tula tried to sit down before she would have to swirl athwart with a fierce bearing. The creature swooped at her, intending to boost her off the craft.

"Tula!" Ren violently shouted out her name in warning before the bird struck.

"Away with you, beast!" Tula ferociously thundered. The sliver hawk spread up into the sky and soared away as told. Tula amassed to a bothered rest on the kayak.

"I didn't know you could control insentient things, Tula." Ren praised his enchanting friend and nurtured the Compass with a steel grasp in his hands.

"Even though Slaggon left, not everything left with him." Roulette banally portended. They voyaged farther down the channel when they noticed in the nearby distance the unusual scenery. Some growth near the sandline was partially or totally perished. Roulette scanned around, a dread began to take over him. He did not often go to this part of the island, but it had not been a decidedly long duration since he visited last. Yet it looked so much different.

"I don't remember this part of Miragon looking this way." Tula observed as she eyed the foliage. She was an ecomancer, she often noticed and sensed more about living things than people without her endowment. Never on any part of the sanctuary did it discharge this barren dankness. Solia watched the decaying surroundings with a cautious vexation.

"I don't think that's the only problem." Ren pointed out, harsh with unease. He motioned to a terrible eradication measurably obstructing their way. Daubs of black were rising and festering in the lucid water in front of them. Dark water had made it's way to Miragon. "Roulette." Ren conjured the name of the fay-guide.

"Huh?" The winged animal zipped closer to him, burden in his stammer. Ren reached out and handed him a purple spiral neatly measuring at a half-stature.

"Take this and submerge it, in the dark water. It will clear a path." The gallant regent collectedly instructed the creature before him in positive assurance. "Not all the way!" He augmented only as a sagacious afterthought.

"But what if I drop-okay." Roulette stuttered. He huddled the Treasure tight, flying to a nearby peak of the razing substance. He let it go partly in and the gook vanished. "So this is what the Treasures do." Roulette stumbled out, both fearful and in a profound amazement. The prince felt in that moment Roulette esteemed him with a lot more respect than he ever had before. Ren nodded his head and propelled onward with Tula. Ioz began to stir.

"Solia..." The half-conscious pirate began to utter, his vitality hung low. His breathing sustained an abstract rhythm.

"Poor Ioz." Tula languidly leaned over the wistful man in support.

"I'm here, big brother, what is it?" Solia tended to him painstakingly. Ren shirked his eyes to her from the bow of the gondola.

"He's not looking so good." Niddler commented accordingly.

"I've never seen dark water in Miragon before, this is recent Ren. Very recent." Roulette mused away as he inclined off the ship, dropping the tip of the helical Treasure into a cluster of obsidian. Worry and sorrow jittered in his voice. He had never seen it at all before now, Ren formed the implication of the winged guardian. Roulette paused to wonder about something and then finally divulged. When the residue from the remnants of predatory sludge had melted away he passed the Treasure back to Ren. "The flower is right up ahead. I think it might be a better idea if I brought it back for you myself." He edged away into rough bracken, taking to the sky. When he departed, the two explorers drafting the boat stopped with brooding deliberation.

"This isn't good, Ren." Tula broke the silence. Then, the burst slugging from the tail of the ship interrupted any light being shed on the quandary at hand.

"No...! I won't let that kreld-eater kill you! Father...!" Ioz stirred but he seemed to be having a dream of some kind. Ren and Tula stared back at him with an preoccupation that distracted them from their current problem. "Bloth...I'll kill you...you...dartha-eel!" His words were strained as he muttered in his sleep. The loud thump echoed against the bulwark of the canoe, Ioz's heel jutted into it.

Solia gasped. "Big brother, no don't tell them about that! Ay chunga!-" Solia blurted out before she knew what she did. She quickly clasped her hands over her mouth but it had been too late, the prince and the ecomancer were already involved. They peered at her with unwavering interest. "Ay chunga. It's nothing important, really!" She tried to push away the touchy subject. Three sets of eyes remained focused on her. She sighed. "You really do care about him, don't you?" She asked, defeated. She received two nods, even a third.

"Noy borga. I guess I better start from the beginning." Solia relented as she started to recount. "Cargo boating was our family business, delivering goods from ports to towns who needed them. We would all become excellent sailors, except for our mother. She only helped with stock and maintenance on the ship." She slowed her thoughts. "Our father was a good man, but an excessive gambler. When he came to port he would often blow all his proceeds at bars and gamehouses. He placed bets, and a few times he was not able to pay them off." Solia's eyes drifted to the two to see if they were following. "Everyone worked in any way they could, from morning to night to get by." She continued nervously and softly, she glimpsed at her dazed brother. "Father...was lost in a boating accident before I was born, our ship had been caught a bad storm and then hit a turbulent reef. Our father was no where to be seen in the aftermath. We thought he had been taken by the sea, but no one ever knew for sure." Solia dismally tapered off.

The skies above a small cargo-carrier consummated with dooming gray. During the expectant moon of the youngest yet to be born, five-year old Ioz sat on the edge of a skimmer next to an older companion who smiled and patted him warmly on the head. He taught the boy to tug a line as his son enjoyed some rare krelga, almost impossible for the poor family to afford. The Drifter Two veered, tilting with a vicious decline. Raymit fought to escalate up the angled deck, but violent winds tore at him. The piddling vessel took a smash against the pounding sea, storm clouds flew overhead and lighting crackled. Young Ioz affixed mournfully to watch off the deck at the head, which had already disappeared.

"They could never find him after that, ever searching continuously." Solia caught her breath and persevered. "Our uncle took over the ship. Ioz grew up with his five brothers but mother struggled to manage. It had been almost another decade and our ship was caught in another gale. This time worse. Uncle was knocked unconscious and Ioz was in a fight with mother. She needed his help steering because he was the oldest and more experienced, but brother was angry because he believed he was being overworked. I was blown into the water that day as he hid away. Our brothers tried to pull us back but they were not as skillful as Ioz. By the time Ioz came out, mother and myself were in the water. He realized his mistake and tried to steer through the heavy waves to rescue us but he didn't succeed and was tossed overboard like us. By the time mother and myself were pulled back on to deck Ioz was lost at sea. He disappeared for a very long time, and mother never was the same." Solia sighed, she peered her ebony eyes up at her spellbounded audience. "As it turned out, he crewed on the bilge-rat's ship for two years and when he came back home, he brought terrible news." Solia began to grow stygian in words, memories beginning to swell.

Many years ago, Ioz hid in a squalid corner inside the cargo hold of the Drifter Two. He lifted the towel off from over him when he heard a distressing crack, even though his brothers found Sanya they weren't able to protect Solia from falling in. Uncle had failed after trying to batten down the loose hatch which was being thrown by the winds. Grappling up from underneath, he dashed to the bow and witnessed his mother fumbling with his dear and youngest sister, who was sopped for any aid in the water. After scrambling to find a line aboard he rushed to the helm where his kid brothers tried to guide closer through the heavy current. He tied the water-bound rope tight to the fortification of the ship, thunder clashed. He tried to make adjustments to retreat when the boat lurched. Ioz only saw his mother and sister emerging up from the edge as he met with the same fate of his father.

"What Solia?" Ren urged her to continue on.

"From what he said, after father became marooned, he crewed for Bloth to try to get back to his old life. Father and brother apparently were in interaction there because when Ioz came back home, he wasn't the same. He was hard, rigid. Brother looked up to the man he barely knew and father had gotten into trouble. He loved to play bets, to wager to make money. Everything was okay with him until one day our father made a wager with the absolute worst person he could have made a wager with." Solia subtly paused, glancing up at the two.

"Bloth." Ren finished her thought.

"Aye." Solia acknowledged with agreement before she went on. "Normally when our father couldn't pay off his debts he would be beaten up or have to endure other savageries by those he owed money to. He would come back undignified or not at all, but none of his debtors were ever so cruel as to take a man responsible for a family and children." Hesitating, she continued. "When Bloth found out he was lied to, he was outraged. Father pleaded to pay off his debt and it was working, for a while. Unfortunately he couldn't endure the hardship to get back to his old life, and his greed took over. He made bet after deal, eventually trying to steal all that drabul back." Solia explained with a temporal pause to study her now demure listeners. Her eyes glanced at her sibling who seemed to be rousing, she felt a tinge of guilt. "When the moons were Red, father ended up fighting thirty of Bloth's men. That was what Ioz brought back, but there was something wrong about the way he was when he came home. Saying our home was gone and that he was trivial to us. He took what little was left of his share of father's gold left to the family as an inheritance and went back. The time he told me he explained wanting to see the kreld-eater fall as the only reason he why he left, and he almost didn't tell me either. I was sore at him over it for a long time, but that's how it ended for him. Now our home is completely submerged by darkness, as mother said...what big-brother learned on the Maelstrom at that time he changed he never told, only the gods of the seas know now..." Finishing with a glum rhythm, she left her ears in a state of wonder but also a deeper understanding.

"I never knew, Solia. Had I known I wouldn't have gotten on him so much, he regrets it now I know. I don't want Ioz to leave us, what he did for us on the Quest wasn't in vain." Tula had been amazed by the account, although she often sensed something dark about her colleague in the past. She still felt sorrow, but no regret at all from Ioz.

"Ay borga, say what you will, Tula, but I never understood why he did what he did. I told him he was selfish." Solia uncomfortably disagreed.

"I guess being rude was the least of his troubles." Tula felt a profound sympathy for the girl and her brother whom she now realized was much more intricate than she perceived. Though, she continually impinged on a mystifying vibe from the breathless guest.

"That's awful to hear, Solia. You are welcome to join us if you don't have anywhere else to go, I know Ioz would want you to be careful." Ren approached her soft-heartedly and kindly. He gandered at his older friend who lay peacefully at the end of the boat. His friend, who had become like a protective older brother to him, he now knew more history about. What little Ioz acquainted of his past had been only trivia that anyone could have known.

"Aye, he doesn't talk about it and neither do I. Thank you for the offer Ren, but I have other towns to see and merchants to steal from. Really, I don't want to be in the way. I should look out for number one, always. It's not enough to get by on our wiles alone, even if it helps us out sometimes. I just hope brother makes it through this time. Ay chunga. He has to keep fighting..." Solia reached down to stroke Ioz's forehead, undeniably concerned about him.

"Do you want something to eat, Solia?" Niddler generously asked the woman and squawked. The monkeybird next to her cutely nuzzled her arm. "I'll share my fruit with you." He shyly extended his paws to offer her some of the fruit he had found.

Solia gave him a smile. "You can keep it, monkeybird." She trilled as she brushed him on the head. He returned a docile caw.

"Oh, did I interrupt something?" The bid from the mouth of the estuary met with the four, they cycled a scouting gleam.

"Roulette! You have the flower!" Ren beckoned with a relieved shout as he claimed the blossom from the flitting patron in the air. Roulette had returned with the Lo-ac from the jungle. "Well, here goes." The enthusiastic man declared, he plucked the flower petals and placed them on the sleeping swashbuckler's forehead. Ioz's dusky eyes fluttered as he started to come to, batting from every side to point as if trying to figure out his placement.

"Noy jitat!" Ioz let out and sat up with a start as Solia lunged on him in a long-anticipated hug and Ren and Tula delightedly grinned.

"Big brother!" Solia's face beamed with alleviation, cheering as she squeezed him hard. She pulled back to allot more room for him to move around.

"Solia? Chungo lungo, by Kuunda am I glad to be back! How long was I out for?" Ioz outstandingly questioned his surroundings, his eyes looked very puzzled.

"Too long." Tula confirmed. She sat next to him and embraced him with a tender but gleeful shoulder-hug. He beamed and granted her a sturdy waist-hug back. Niddler nestled him with feathers and happily squawked.

"Ren! Good to see you again, buddy!" Ioz saw Ren and squeezed with him a brotherly bearhug, boosting him up off the boat. The prince returned an expression of felicity.

"Good to see you again too, Ioz." Ren welcomed him with merriment as the three allowed the newly cured sailorman some space, except for Solia, who remained close by his side. "Joat poisoned you so we came to Miragon to get the Lo-ac flower." The blond aristocrat updated the drowsy seafarer with detail, his patient demeanor reappeared.

"I know." Ioz vouched durably. "Where is he now?" He investigated in a severe manner.

"Gone. The naja-dog ran off after he shot you." The prince conferred with evaporated words. Ioz appeared to be languishing about something.

"Not to break up a happy reunion, but you guys should be heading out soon if you can." Roulette floated near under tiny and trembling wings. His augury contained a hint of grief as he peered about at the invading puddles of dark water, which had returned in stagnating glops but were no less menacing. Tula espied him with empathy. "Anyway, I can show you the way out." He shrinkingly stuttered out.

Ren stood up and issued a polite gesture. "Thank you for everything, Roulette. We are most grateful you have assisted us." Ren professed with an upward glance, continuing his ideas.

Roulette whimpered a curtailed laugh. "Anything for an old buddy, besides you've helped me a sea-bundle." Roulette graciously acclaimed and smiled feebly at Ren, he blinked at him with a pang of sorrow. His vision flickered around timorously at the dark water when Ren picked up on his despair. Ioz started to notice the blotches now too, and nearly cursed in an alarmed fright. Solia scrutinized the puny airborne-creature and realized what had been happening. Ren burrowed part of the Treasure into a nearby patch, cleaning it up.

"Hey, ay chunga, maybe we should take the little sky-rat with us." Solia charitably simpered. Roulette just peered at her with uncertainty and unhappy focus.

"He can't, Solia. This is his home." Tula gave the sister-of-the-pirate the response she ecomantically sensed from the winged mammal. Solia's reaction was a cluelessness at first, but she understood.

"Are you sure you'll be fine here on your own, Roulette?" Ren invited him, rooting for some reassurance.

Roulette flapped close. "I'll be fine. Just you promise you find those Treasures, you hear. Don't fail me, you mud-slinger!" Roulette flit over to rest on Ren's shoulder to justify his answer. He tried to find humor in the situation. Ren creaked a smile. Roulette abdicated to his normal manner of speaking.

"I'll show you the way out." He zipped on ahead of them as they continued to row out, ready to depart.

The adventurers dragged on back to the Wraith, which floated on the rope docking it to shore. "Farewell travelers!" The aerial creation carried out his final goodbye to them.

"Take care, Roulette! I promise I'll find the rest of the Treasures!" Ren called away from the stern of the moving Wraith as he produced a hand to his cheekbone to ricochet the semblance. Tula handled at the wheel again. He could only see the minuscule creature moving away from him and waving a paw with a meek sense of hope. The ship steered for the open sea outside of Miragon. The wind held strong. The skies and water presided, ever clear.

In the great session of time later, Ren turned to Ioz who rested next to Tula and near to Solia and Niddler. "Ioz...while you were sleeping, your sister..." Ren tried to pull his shipmate aside to speak to him inconspicuously, not sure exactly how to approach the subject. Solia heard him begin and covered her mouth in shame.

Ioz bore him with a knowing gaze. "I wasn't entirely asleep." Ioz plainly offered, glancing at Ren. "It's true." He stated emphatically and then switched his eyes to Solia, who uncovered her lips and now framed her cast as if she felt a woe of fault. Ioz tottered her a comforting glance and she relaxed. "And the sea-scum knows it and he uses it against me whenever he can." He signified genuinely but burdensomely, heeding back on the young prince. Ren looked about to apologize for prying but the pirate shot him a glint saying he did not need to. "I don't talk about it, only Solia and Zoolie know about it. Just because I consider you a brother, Ren, don't think I won't do anything if you tell anyone else." Ioz mustered a tough threat with an exacting smile, but Ren could see through him.

"Right, but remember Ioz, we're a crew that tells our tales." Ren agreed to his deal with Ioz, as did Tula. With a witty expression at his comrade, he acceded a nod. "Like now we'll continue ours to find the Treasures of Rule!" He asserted to further push onward. "We have three more left to find before we can restore Octopon and Mer back to their rightful glory." Ren steadfastly guaranteed. "And stop the spread of the dark water!" He prevailed with the Compass as he held it up and observed a luminous beam shoot out.

"And end Bloth's tyranny for good!" Tula accompanied as she pumped a fist above and into the air.

"And find lots of Treasure!" Ioz chimed in, smiling now as Solia winked at him.

"Why didn't we get any food from Miragon?" Niddler pitifully whined and squawked.

"The Compass points to Pandaawa! To the 11th Treasure of Rule!" Ren pronounced with a forward gesture, to the conquest of their odyssey. The Compass led with a brilliant blaze of blue into the wide-open beyond. The Wraith rocked steadily as it sailed Pandaawa-bound on the crystal seas and under the prime skies of Mer.

"Seriously! We are completely out of food!" Niddler cried out in a pathetic panic.

"Noy jitat!" Ioz hotly swore.

Surrounding a growling chasm, a pair of contrasting proportions perched. The characters scowled hatefully at a screaming fixture lashed to the rim by steady rope. The bindings held snug on the victim's ankles, his visual perspective reversed.

"There is no more time to fuddle around." The pressing sound came from atop. The prodigious master issued to a scanty cohort.

"Please I will do anything!" The pleading vassal would continue to cry his way to freedom, at least forage every attempt.

"There's nothing out here, the dagrons haven't been fed in a week." The minimal swordsman squirmed a reply, he toted an unsheathed edge from a jabbing angle.

"Well, Iskjar of the Kree, Captain of the late King Primus, you can start by telling me what your dear Prince Ren knows about the Treasure found off the coast of Kalinda. Did it give him any...questionable abilities?" The hazardous inquest loomed.

"Yes! I mean no! I mean...please don't hurt me..." Iskjar gazed at his captive situation, soreness arched through his head and he could not avert his innermost apprehension. He peeked down at the dagron den below him, he could see Bloth and the squadron administrator through bars but not well. Gnarling and snaps of ferocious mandibles scaled for his bristling mane. He was suspended in a rather undignified position, it would be impossible to clout his legs free, not that he would desire to.

"That depends on whether you're willing to cooperate." Bloth paced to and fro above the upsidedown man, impending honesty from his viced informant.

"Please! I don't know anything, just The Surge!" The racked agent wailed, a crack of a scaly set of teeth ripped a lock of his hair.

"The Surge?" The slim onlooker composedly questioned. The glitter from a sword drew. The light touched a twine strand.

"My commander, Liege Mizzen-Conquest, those brainless bilge-keepers will think you are the Faceless One. If you incinerate any trace from the remains of our defiant guest in the Teeth of Moltis nearby, make sure it stays that way. We don't want the entire village following us. His vengeful people are very...smart at identifying bones. For some reason our boy and his important friends seem to have Kuunda's hand in squirming out of the Constrictus's maw, be sure to keep this clue in mind when you order the men to...clean him up. His screams are just as pleasant from the starboard, but I prefer to watch." The giant's instructing commands fell on the near officer. Iskjar's inverted features tracked the lean pirate at the right-hand of Bloth snapping on a set of bone-armor thick enough to withstand temperatures of high heat, the helmet waited in the crook of a sinewy elbow as the Captain passed back a scythe. Liege Mizzen-Conquest held Iskjar's spiritual scythe, and a sickle for the reaping.

"Bloth, my people were caretakers of a River up North but what you believe about it is surely a myth! There was only One River on the whole of Mer, and even if it did what you said, it would have been long gone by now! Do what you wish to me, but you imbue yourself with perpetual idiocy for doing so!" Iskjar convulsed while a friendly company proceeded to covet his excitement with lapping saliva.

"You said you would cooperate but all I have heard is bilge from your lips. It's an unfortunate fact, my good man, that lack of information in conjunction with sniveling often leads to helping the wrong side." The Captain ceased from his stride, he whirled his head about to think. He returned it. "Time for you to be set free." Bloth ruthlessly attested. "Get rid of him." He ordered.

"No!" The ensnared prisoner cried. The solo shadow of an unusual glance jolted to a blademaster in bonemail.

Mantus's slicing blade flashed, a Kree native's scream sounded from the obscure part of the deck.

On a wide range of ocean just off the West Coast of a land called Janda, a figure was deeply transfixed inside a chamber of a quietly waiting vessel. In front of him sat a wan map where a crooked reptilian hand pointed.

"My sources tell me the boy is headed for Pandaawa. We will port there." Strew a slithering voice.

"What is the plan this time?" The more pretentious one tensed in a gruff question.

"We meet him there, of course. We will wait for the right time, to take him. You remember our Test?" The lurking analysis hissed on the last word. Two oddly-shaped forms in the room scoped out the paper below.

"I do, but what if it only causes me a great deal of trouble?" The heavy proprietor droned with doubt.

"I think you will find the results to be to your liking. We know he has a fool's weakness. A crew is only as strong as it's weakest link." The reptilian reassured. The shape stood to look at the large one next to him. The tentacle arm retreated and stroked a tiny skull hanging loose like a neck amulet. It filled with a piquing black ooze.

"Of course." The growling discourse and a sly laugh hung in stale air, a brimming finger traced it's way down to a red-marked X on the page underneath. It trailed off as it touched down on a place verily North of an encircled territory labeled Pandaawa. "Our prince will never know what he's gotten himself into!" The low chuckle sounded through the grungy room.

From the barely opened doorway to the room, a wiry and frail form squinted through the crack ever silently at his captain and the part-creature nearby. The quest must go on. He watched a scummy and threatening eye of orange burst in his direction, he glowered and craftily slipped away.

~Now that Ioz is healthy, the Quest seems to have taken a different road to Pandaawa but with Bloth on his way, what new dangers await our heroes?~

END PART ONE


	9. Calm Before the Storm

DARK WATER: Chronicles of Octopon

Chapter 8 Calm Before The Storm

There were a seemingly endless sea of pirates surrounding a ship in the sea. The two men and two woman with a monkeybird were fighting for their lives as the ruthless and cruel invaders attempted to board the terrace.

"Ioz, steer us away. We'll ready the hang-glider!" The young man of golden hair wielded a partially obliterated weapon as he ordered from the starboard of the deck. He slashed off a brutish raider who was trying to climb up the hull of the Wraith. By his side strove a sable-complexioned lass. "Solia!" Ren shouted to her in warning of the approaching cutthroat.

"Noy jitat! I'll hold them off and make for shore!" The deep-skinned woman bravely hastened in accordance to the boy next to her. She had just finished bunging a scurvy seadog from the net of the mainstay Ren scurried to crawl up.

"Glider is ready, Ren! Jump aboard!" The monkeybird from the deck squalled out as a dusky thief, a brunette ecomancer and the regal grabbed hold of the mesh and jumped to the rod of the sail which doubled as a glider. Niddler himself threw a switch to release the contraption and then he took to the skies, grasping primate hands on of the bar of the embarking hang-glider.

The wing whooshed through the air at an awesome speed. It was flying past the schooner below, which barreled speedily for the shore of the land it had been scudding to. "Oh no!" The comely ecomancer to the left of the pony-tailed prince screamed in fright. The four of them were shooting too fast and her hand detached. The air that had been upholding them wouldn't let them slow down. Horribly, the vital prince witnessed the sight fading from him.

"Tula!" Ren cried out, suffering to see the alluring lady falling from the hang-glider. She dwindled down, distant into the sea. She screamed out his name in helplessness as she sunk into the sickening black below and unprotected.

"Ren!" The sable-haired sorceress uselessly called out and peered up at the artificially-aloft construct above. Tula wailed to Ren as she fought against the binding inevitable. He witnessed her shoulders and head sink low into the dark inescapeable.

"No! By Kuunda I'll find a way! I promise Tula!" Ren riled and combat his emotions. He forced his head skyward. In no longer than a broken instant, the net had enclosed around them. It sealed the way out, making airtight any escape plan previously conspired. Ioz blazoned to him from his side. Ren clawed at the metal ropes and could not compel motion, he heard another toll suffusing him from a sandbar plainly a few lengths away from his region.

"Ren! Use the Treasure! The Treasure, Ren! It's the only thing..." The voice discontinued as if having trouble surmounting words. "That can save Octopon!" The old man's ring howled to him in desperation. Blue eyes matching his own bore into him with immersion. The elder's snowy beard ruffled as he could be seen. Ren's vision reeled and grew blurry as if he were underwater.

"Father!" Ren rallied to shudder out, the apparition of his origin bleached in his view. He ripped hard against the web as he, Ioz and Niddler remained trapped. Trying, but impeded from reaching the shoreline. His scrutiny began to fizzle as if he were about to black out.

"All hope is lost!" Ren's ears picked up the white-haired kin moaning from the shore as if in mourning, he could no longer see. Ren felt his body thump against something as he hit the ground.

"Ren, look out!" Ioz panicked from shoulderblade, hightailing a warning tap. Ren soared around.

Ren could see the prime partner behind him who caught blade with a turbulent sword that intended itself for Ren. The considerable shard of steel buffeted Ioz back and struck him so hard it bashed him to the ground. Ioz flopped motionless and loosened his weapon, which slid across the miserable deck floor. "Ioz, no!" Ren rued with terror flooding into his lungs. The monkeybird aviated toward him and had almost secured his destination before being refrained and vise-gripped by the talons of a dagron. Feathers floated down from the breeze, the coral-winged primate's angry grievances became mute. "Niddler!" Ren sorrowed desperately. Something latched around his arms and started pulling him down. He felt his back sliding against wood and leviathan bones of a well-crafted railing of a moving behemoth. The force tore at him so mightily, it seared, like it were going to rend his arms away. The large hand caged his neck, making it difficult for him to move. He watched another hand thresh down and sever the Compass off him, he saw it floating and drifting away from it's home near his chest. He shuddered.

"Did you really think I would let you obtain the Treasures, Ren?" Then the odium terrorized, which jarred his senses. He meekly gazed up as his attacker's face became partially obscured. That beastly evil-one echoed a disdainful laugh. "You don't deserve to be Prince of Octopon, you don't deserve to rule this world. I am the only ruler this world will ever have." Bloth laughed infernally.

Ren started to fail in vision again as he observed the cold periwinkle of fingernails piercing into his neck. That adversary who framed and slaughtered his father was pushing him down into a force, which continued to cut at him. He faintly saw the black mass beginning to swallow him up, crippling and stretching his arms away from him and out of his ability. Beside his oppressor stood the silhouette of the partial-man, standing loyally by the Captain's side and employing the dark water which had begun to entomb him. He delved deep and stormily in, perfectly buried to the head above. He exhausted against himself, falling back into gloom and being unable to pry his arms free. The palm now weighted him in at the top of his scalp. "No!" He brittlely bleat out, he couldn't move. His body gave out.

Ren's heart hopped as his eyes zoomed open. The Merian sun arranged high in the sky, hotness pounded over the scape. He tranquilized his breathing as he erased sweat from his forehead. He rotated about at his surroundings, which materialized to be the kind of dense foliage found in heavy marshland. He felt the grime on his fingers, he presumed from digging into dirt. The nightmare felt far too real. He sat up and snipped a fragment of a leafy vine out from behind his ear, a strange mist wafted all around him. Evidently, he had fallen in swamp muck which meant he would have to be tremendously dirty. His friends were nowhere to be seen. "Tula!" Ren began to call relentlessly after his crew as he hurried up. "Ioz?" He paused. "Niddler?" He trembled. He listened to a noise and his head jut around to it's source. The figure meeting his eyes dispensed from the murky trees.

"Ren..." Tula drastically outcried his name as she spotted him. The pink-clothed woman threshed toward him with aching eyes and embraced him so tight that she almost hindered him from speaking, she did not want to let him go. The prince felt his heart pound in jitters, his stomach filled with butterflies.

"What's wrong, Tula? What happened?" The mud-dabbled blond inquired her, his mannerism shook. His arms clutched protectively around her waist.

"Help me, Ren. I don't want to stay here. Please can we go home where we can be safe? It will just be us." The rose-clad beauty squeezed out in fearful words. "I don't want to finish the Quest, it's too dangerous..." She pleaded to him, squealing out and begging him to shield her from some unknown or invisible enemy. Something looked to be wrong with her eyes, their green appearance showed a vacant phase and dilated with rotund pupils.

"Tula, what's wrong? What's gotten into...you-" The prince began to bequest her with a puzzled perplexity when his thoughts ran away from him. All he could focus on was the time he failed to save her from falling into dark water before they were captured and brought back to the Maelstrom. The reminder upset him. All he wanted to do now was care for the woman in his arms and keep her safe, but he felt a pervading sorrow. Without any way of predicting, his thoughts vacillated to his father again, Primus, the King of Octopon, killed by the sea and right in front of him. He wasn't able to save him. "Father..." Ren droned on, his mind tormenting him from inside.

Tula's laden emeralds flickered awestruck as she had lost control of her fingers and hands, which were now nailing into Ren's sides to the point it disturbed him. "The water! Evil!" Tula wailed, she glazed as if she had remembered something long-embedded and horrible. "Don't go!" The plagued ecomancer screamed out with a loud and upsetting groan. She started to feel tender, she peered at one of the trees nearby. "Why couldn't I stop it on Andorus?! I was six, why?" She vocalized the only thing she could utter from her lips in a muddled and strained whisper. Ren came to his senses. He shook Tula and she gradually reverted. Her vert eyes shocked at her spinning surroundings, and then up at Ren atop her. "I was at our home...someone was trying to...stop invaders but the dark water..." She quivered to inhale. "And Teron...was there, with mother?" She dolefully lumbered on. Her eyes doused, similar to her state of ecomantic-energy expenditure.

"This place isn't real!" Ren boldly exposed grounds to her. He aided her upward. Ioz rushed out of the swamp directly for them, able saber brandished and face twisted into one of contemptuous and powerless rage.

"Kreld-eaters...let him go! Over my brackish-soaked body you'll find Solia at port, I'm going to make your days an endless nightmate, scoundrel!" The pirate brutally exploded and had advanced forth as if he planned to sliver them to pieces. The young man and woman were frightfully about to hurdle for the thick brush when another outcry echoed through the viridian heap.

"Noy borga! Hurry up! Dark Water!" The howl of an alarmed female carried out to them.

"Solia!" Ioz hollered back as if he were now rebounding to his senses. He gawked at his mates and sheathed his sword, which had been cleaved above his head with both hands in his confoundment. "Noy jitat! We're in the jitatan Swamp of Sorrows!" He related, madly stumbling on to a clarion conclusion. "Chungo lungo! The memories are too real!" He expelled in angst as he braced his head, trying to fight away the dreams and emotions inside.

"That's right Ioz, and if we don't get out of here, we'll be here until we're a memory ourselves! Now come on!" Tula asserted with vigor. She wrenched the rogue's arm and pulled him toward a clearing of the trees as Ren bounded and vigilantly clutched her other hand. In anticipation they raced to find the girl who had long stopped hailing.

"Where's Niddler?" Ren shouted, forcibly scrambling to find the missing member of their team. "We have to get out of this mist...!" The prince stressed, the flashbacks were starting to surge back into his head. He cracked his vision at a noise flowing from behind the bracken just ahead of them. The crew forced their way in front of the inviting gap in the treacherous plantlife.

"Jargis! No! I don't want to go! Please don't make me!" The crimson-feathered monkeybird lamentably cawed from the midst of tossing on the ground. His eyes presented a glassy condition as he squawked and withered with broken phrases, collapsed with an awful dread. The sandy-locked heir hurried to him from the rear of the fleeing trio and rattled him in desperation.

"Niddler! Come to! It's an illusion!" Ren urgently attempted to rationalize to his friend. "Noy jitat!" He rocked the monkeybird over and again, but he had only been met by the glossy-verdant eyes of a mentally-compromised avian.

"My Queen! Your Majesty! Please don't hurt her!" Niddler's cries were of a desolate torment, as if he were being eaten alive.

"He's too deep in!" Ren bluntly forfeited, under frustration. The prince then descried no further option and without any more hesitation, picked up the agonized monkeybird in his arms like a mother coddling a child. "Now let's get to the Wraith!" He strenuously ordered, the group pounded toward the approaching shore as fast as their legs would carry them. At some point after being bumped on Ren's shoulder, the downy primate awoke and his blanched-out eyes returned to their normal polish of robust green.

"Ren? Wha-" Niddler sputtered, his speech being hampered by the running prince who jostled him through uneven pathways out of the cramming marsh. The four of them briskly skid to an advancement on the ship ahead. Solia was backing up against the trimming, about to jump off the bow to escape the trespassing murk that was raising itself into the air. Ren let go of the monkeybird, who incited a squawk and touched the sky. The regal slid against the dirt on his bust and with the Treasure in his hand, only sparingly touched the disaster guzzling the ship. It fizzled like a geyser and bubbled into a dulling oblivion.

Ren faintly exhaled. Near his hand he noticed a flattened eel of some breed that leaked a purple fluid. He immediately whipped in reverse. He climbed up to the platform before Tula and Ioz. Niddler had already come to ease. "There's no Treasure here." The exhausted hero panted, the lively crystal of the Compass kindled in his palms. "The Treasure...is it, moving?" He feared as he impetuously squinted his eyes. The Compass wasn't tracking very well.

"It must be this mist." Tula assumed a guess, resting on the pier of the deck near the stoop. "Good thing we'll be in Pandaawa soon, I think we could use a bath." She stated visibly, traveling her eyes to the slime-caked pirate across from her. "Especially you, Ioz." The tired air saturated her reprove.

"Hey, Ren is just as dirty as I am!" Ioz collected a retort, pointing to the subject of his accusation who not only had layers of mud on the back end of his clothes but also in his imperial mane. He didn't say any more but was later heard grumbling something about women and their obsessions with cleanliness.

"Noy jitat, dirt isn't the only muck we've been drenched in. I don't think I can't get by with my Father's sword like this..." Ren joylessly assessed the damage to his artifact, one side of which was near-totalled by rust.

"While we're at the weapon's shop, you may want to pick up a cutlass or two for these chunga-lungas, so they can defend themselves properly. Let me guess, you can't even hit my sword with your mess knife." Ioz balanced his still blade as he instructed the orphans with gentle words for once. Lus-nayi did better than her younger sister but both handles flopped to the planking under their dainty might. "We'll save the dragonbows for me then." He sheathed and naturally left the students to their own practice.

"The only good act to come out of this voyage is that Ioz is finally willing to get rid of that atrocious coat." Tula admitted how tickled-pink she had been when she saw Ioz firsthand as he dumped the rainbow garb overboard...in her hopes and prayers, the curse placed on it as well.

"Hmph! There was a hole in the pocket woman, how was I able to sell it like that?" Ioz excused himself, groaning with a short temper.

"Nothing else happened while you were gone." The shaken Solia inspired out, mien deranging at anything of coal hue. "I didn't know what to do without the Treasure." She began a change of subject to something of more importance as the Wraith unwaveringly sailed to the borders of the monkeybird nation.

Though the seas were strewn with mortal water, the explorers navigated the road to port. The sun had begun to set over the sphere as a burgundy ship hugged the dock. Six humans and a monkeybird swaggered down from the gangplank of the bateau, making their way into a clearing inside a city that bordered a lush tropic.

"I forgot how difficult to navigate Pandaawa's seas are, we can buy a replacement in town." On the path out from dock, Tula assayed the damage of a torn and drooping sail. "You'll handle the replacement parts, right Ioz?" She confronted her seafaring companion to be sure.

"Of course, woman. You don't even need to ask." Ioz stoutly settled without a hint of wavering. Tula peered at him, seeming solaced.

"An ecomancer! Bury her in the sand so she'll grow our plants!" No sooner had the Wraith debarked than did a swarm of foreigners toting shovels scoot forward with hails. The heads shielded with scaly fish-helms were undeniable.

"It can't be!" Solia covered her mouth after an excited burst.

"It is!" Ren exclaimed with a gasp.

"Farming fish-fanatics." Ioz gaped at the prevailing array with a stunned breath.

The gaggle of aquatic scoop-bearers immediately seized Tula and hurled her into a nearby ditch of sand, then proceeded to amass her up to her neck with the silt. They then dug her out and boosted her up again. "Hello! Hello! Hello!" The talking fish-domes warmly greeted.

"Welcome to Pandaawa!" The fish-head appearing to be the chieftain of the organization erupted.

"Ahhh!" Tula exclaimed with a badgered yell until she received a hand from the main native. "So this is who has moved in after Jargis's reign?" She wondered as she ambled up. "Nice to meet you, I'm Tula." She reluctantly held out a palm to entertain the bizarre company.

"Welcome Tula and guests, it is our duty to inform all New Pandaawans of the Doctrine of Sultan Zombie Jello Chicken." Another secondary local allot with the sweep of a flippery hand.

"These are the New Pandaawans?" Niddler baffled with the scratch of a fluffy head.

"They farm fruit-trees and plant fish, or so I've heard?" Ioz absurdly avouched from a stance of crossed arms.

"Fruit trees! These are neighbors I can live with!" Niddler favorably delighted as he was embraced by two orphans. "Wait, plant fish?" He tried to theoretically depict the confusing claim.

"The fish on the two moons know what we're thinking! They're husband and wife!" Several fish-endorsers from the bevy carried about. "Complimentary fish-helmets to protect you from Moonshine!" The Chief and a bundle of followers passed forward a batch of severed heads of blue swimmers, offering to dress. The crew of Wraith instantly withdrew.

"Blench! Get that smelly wharf-rat stew away from me!" With repulsion Solia cowered to shun the dried carcass.

"Goodbye! Goodbye! Goodbye!" The freaks departed and gamboled happily into the red sun with plows hoisted high.

"You never know what you might find." Ioz candidly bantered.

"They tried to put a dead-fish on my head!" Solia cringed with a stick of her tongue.

"At least the new people of Pandaawa are productive." Ren noted a positive point.

"Sure, Ren. Productive. I don't believe that lunacy." Ioz scoffed as he persisted on with enduring steps.

"We pray you'll spare a little bit of your profit as a well-off man-servant, we seek the Guyfoo Capsule to bring our parents back to life and restore our family honor! My sister, Lus-nayi, was forced to take the ceremony after we lost both our parents by a pirate she wishes she never knew and now we're considered as them because of it...she didn't have a choice-you're the most well-known name of your profession!" Joiquiva contested the only woman in the city who understood what it was like.

"You're grown women, so stop crying like jitatan dolls!" The offended denizen squeezed a pair of snoopers out of her grotto with an abrupt heave.

"But we're only just old enough to-" Joiquiva solicited the only ear who had given her a mere instant to speak on the sisters' behalf with all bashfulness. The strength of social bravery was a farflung hike to the traditional practices and strict doctrine she was brought up with.

"I'm in the same boat as you are, whelps!" Bearing an abnormally-sheared sandal, the fickle mistress booted panelling on her gate with a snubbing slur.

"But you make a thousand drabul in one moonrise! Lus-nayi can weave with magic silk, second only to the princess of Qui-Qua, her suitors were the fittest and wealthiest. She would have once given her house many children, and lived happily for a long time!" Awareness of this jam touched on the refugee by no choice of her own, Joiquiva had become a woman who opened her mouth to complain. Like their vocal mother while alive had for the wellfare of her children, the daughters who had outlived her changed the dynamic. Lus-nayi had become the child she never was while Joiquiva assumed both roles of father and mother.

"Yes, and I splurge 800 of it keeping up appearences! I'm forty years old! If I don't look the part those song-starved sea-scamps find another port-maiden fresh-off-the-boat to give their money and storm-boasted whispers to! Pandaawa calls me Miss Delta because I answer to any scurvy-slime who calls me by my pay-name. What? Pirates like the smell of what's familiar." Fluffing her large chest, the scent of Miss Delta's perfume raged with her mood. She slapped a fish covered in barnacles on top of her patched face while she mixed up a combination of pulverized landshark-fang and nycra-blood along with a carnal goo secreted from the stingers of giant wasps. Nomadic stragglers aged-sixteen coughed from the whiff of shirry-urchin pheromone. "Find charity from elsewhere." She strayed on to douse herself in the beauty concoction. After she caked enough mud and borca-paste over her different skin to give herself that fashionable Merrian-tan she continued to smear on enough makeup so she wouldn't look anything remotely human, yet she appeared less of a freak than she actually was. Lus-nayi and Joiquiva witnessed her finish with rolling her thigh straps and nabbing her slipshod feelers on the crank of a detached steering-wheel to lace her corset. The orphans hushed with gloomy eyes.

"Don't tell me you were never in that position. If you keep using all those cosmetics, it will melt your skin away..." Joiquiva mentioned in her sincere concern for the city's vixen.

"You don't have my sympathy, both of you are stupid!" Though they were hopeful the begging had won Miss Delta over the jilted sisters wilted at the end of a painful slap. "Men of the sea are animals and I see twenty of them each day in this jitatan barnacle-hole, if you don't want to pay the price to buy them off or give them what they want then don't expect hard-workers like me to make up for your blunder. Anything gold belongs to them and they don't care if you haven't taken the ceremony, it happens here all the time. You should have stayed out of Bloth's way and left his treasure-heads alone, now the Maelstrom is docked and I'm going to make a bundle off of his lug-heads." When she feuded with Lus-nayi and Joiquiva to move along, Miss Delta strut out of her bungalow after her transformation into the perfect tavern-doll.

"We didn't know about Bloth, we've never even seen a pirate until our village was razed to the ground. Beware of the pirate called Mantus, he betrays the maidens from his village." Joiquiva wept in the shame of her sister's abandon. How if they only were given another chance by Kuunda to set it right...

"If your village is so important to you, then tell it to mom and dad." Miss Delta's insecure pride fused like a cold sea-geisha full of spite as she marched off in can heels. She sputtered with anything but envious success at their girlish figures.

"There's no need to beg. I'm keeping the money we need for essential provisions. Stay together, we don't want anyone to get hurt." Ren backswept at the twins to foster a wary rolecall.

"How much, wench?" Further away, the grunt of a persisting wanderer intruded.

"30 drabul for one lullaby, that's 120 for each of you, pirates. Also, you better leave those knives where I can see them. You too, toad-pint." The sound of a tavern door slam from the nearing market caused the judgmental disarray of a few heads.

"Are you sure you'll be okay here on your own Solia? You can stay with us until we return the Treasure to the lighthouse, if you wish." Ren generously posed to the young woman after collecting his consideration.

"I'll be fine, Ren. So nice of you to ask." Solia, at eye distance with Ren, flirtatiously confessed. She leaned in front of him and showered him with a close hug and a farewell kiss, to which he shivered with a nervous jolt. Tula, who had only been a half-length away, confined an infuriated glare. "I shouldn't stay, I wouldn't want to make Tula lonely." She teased, cleverly winking at the ecomancer. Tula looked as if she desired to retch. Solia walked over to Ioz. "I'll see you around, big brother." She playfully gestured as she dashed him a witty bat of a lash, but then hugged him adoringly. She leaned to Ioz's ear to whisper something only he heard, and he responded with an understanding face. "Farewell, Niddler." She crouched down to the monkeybird and patted his head, stroking his feathers as she hopped back up. She then swiveled around to skip off, her curves lost shape through the herd of the town.

"Thank Kuunda." Tula relieved half-heartedly as her rival's frame melted into the crowd. She still felt more sympathy for Solia, but she had been annoyed by the woman's insistence on talking her up before leaving.

"She'll find us again." Ioz unaffectedly added. He adhered a note in his palm his sister had given to him. Something addressed to them both was inscribed on the paper.

"There is trouble with the pirates, there is murder on the seas!" Momentarily the Wraith's crew stared at the random bystander as he skipped on in his shanty down the road of the Pandaawa market.

"Now we can finally get something to eat. I am so starving..." Niddler groaned as he patted through the villa, slightly behind the rest of the group as he monitored his unfavorable surroundings. Howls and chuckles from swarms of miscreants seemed to be routine in the prevalent part of the country. Were he a knowledgeable mariner like Ioz, he might swear he were in Janda-town with all the clatter from broken ale-bottles and strife. Worse then Janda-town, likely. The capital of Pandaawa made him leery because of his history here, even though Jargis had been banished. More importantly, he had not eaten essentially in about a week, or two. Everyone was hungry.

"Please help me out, I was robbed! Slimy thieves, pirates! They left and didn't pay, I need the money! Bad!" From a deviant avenue, a scream sounded out.

"I'm sorry, Miss Delta, there's nothing I can do for you." The patrolman shrugged regretfully.

"Hey, wait!" Ren hastened to call after the source, but Delta had already pelted away in a fury after the scrambling targets of her pursuit. The zippy ringleader and three stubby rustlers disappeared into the looping street like a midnight seabreeze over shards of shattered windows. One of the laughing characters fell behind and narrowly dodged a screeching brick from Delta. "Pandaawa sure has changed, Niddler." He sighed, the monkeybird concurred with a sensitive nod.

"What did Solia say to you Ioz?" Tula inquired suspiciously of the pirate, but he pocketed the note.

"Nothing." Ioz peered at the woman next to him and abruptly professed. "Just about our family. Mother, her inheritance to me...she left back in Tayhoj, but I'm staying. The Quest must go on." He at last replied truthfully, not willing to go into details. Indeed the Quest and his companions had been more important to the former Bloth-pirate than money, though Ioz did wish to pay his respects. Tula sensed this, and didn't pry further.

Downstream of a path proximate to a band of sojourners, another conversation processed between two men.

"Our intelligence doesn't lie." The voice of acrid gravel insisted.

"Jargis ain't here anymore, lubbin' half-masted fish-freaks moved in and the Securitat have nothing to do but bum around with denbar sea-slugs. Aye and I 'earda you, you're Liege Mizzen-Conquest. That name is reviled by all men, dreaded by all women but you're nothing to the Faceless One and his Order, so why should I give my month's pay for a chance he won't go for it? There ain't no room for that kinda rudderless Sport on Pandaawa anymore, Z.M.Q. is running rampant on everything here, mate. Who in the twenty seas do you think you are?" The skeptical and round merchant hassled his slippery antagonist.

"500. If it fails." The wringing response overruled.

"The deal has been made, my friend." The savvy trader grinned enthusiastically, replying with a wink. He had been handed off a bizarre object, as he passed a heavy bag of gold in turn to the lurking heckler. His strange company soared that snarling head in a whirl at the approach of four other guests, he spied the man's hand trail to a piercing dagger harbored at the waist. The wasted frame leapt for a narrow ledge in a side alley where it could no longer be seen. He only heard the jangle of the nearby trunk moving before any trace of the stranger dissolved completely into the city.

"That's strange. The Compass is pointing back North now." Ren noticed, curiously puzzled. He watched the glare of the Compass as they wandered through the hustle and bustle of the merchanting town.

"Maybe we lost the signal before?" Niddler cast his suggestion.

"That could be..." Ren ruminated on a fickle conjure, he lost his mind in study. "We'll stop for a break here and get supplies, then we'll head back." He announced the order of business as he carried on.

"I hope he knows what he's doing..." With a nagging twinge of worry, Tula speculated. She stalled next to an introverted Ioz, who seemed to be nearly misplaced in a daze but turned to her with a signaling a motion of agreement. Ren stumbled into a convenient tavern after buying a skin of cleaning nectar.

Three more customers and a pair of twins entered one by one.

"Can't you see I'm busy? You're not the first priority, runts!" Ren had waited at the foyer with his partners until Ioz finally spoke up and received a balking sass from the waitress on duty. With a musclebound arm the middle-aged hireling carried a humongous tray of steaming meats over her shoulder and scrambled for the table to the rearmost panel.

"Dirty-cheating-underlings of Bloth, starboard-booth!" Tula gasped. Sets of stricken eyes bounced in the direction of her peek. The den-matron laid the heap of foodstuffs at a counter where Mantus and Konk sat, an ox-brute and another balding swordsman with them.

"Maybe table of six wasn't such a good idea. No problem, we can just sneak out..." Ren unluckily retracted his endeavor, discreetly rising from the dining bench and lurching into the corner with the Quin sisters. They all hugged the walls as they slowly moved for the exit.

"Our meal arrived late." Mantus softly growled at the woman. The well-composed duelist practically threw his empty glass at her.

"It's only been five!" The forbearing owner demanded otherwise until she witnessed the seething anger from Mantus. "But...we'll give you a refund, I'm very sorry about that. Forget about it, it's on the house! Here it is..." She nervously backed away, Mantus began snickering with the rest of the pack. Though the commander spent more time wiping his mouth from his refilled mug, he ate with cleaner scrutiny than the alternate co-mates who were chewing with their mouthes open.

The adventurers eavesdropped on a nearby barmaid who seemed worried, but the server proceeded to tell her they were Bloth's men and the fastest way to get rid of them was not to give them any trouble. The management consisting of women and budding men were not simmering about the loss. Mantus snapped an arm out in a fragmented instant at a passing woman to plunk her on his lap, subduing the giggly patron. She wasn't impressed with his short advance but she soundly wondered at the gilded rings draped on the rich schemer's wallowing ears and beard-strands. The wench flirtatiously hitched up her skirt and used her free hand to draw a knife at the gold on Mantus's whiskers, being very close to flicking the prize as he continued to drink and ogle.

"Me like going to port with Mantus, me gets free ale! And...service! These wenches be our game!" Konk heartened into stuffing his face and slurring his jargon. "Fetch!" He hurled a poultry bone to the floor, inciting a waitress to pick it up. Mantus wholeheartedly laughed along with Konk and the barbarian.

"What pigs..." Tula grit her teeth with contempt. Ioz decently shushed her.

"Vlor says Ruyonk will get it this week, but I don't think so. You say, Graff?" Mantus threw two drabul down at his prospective opinion. The now discomforted wench found herself groaning, and wishing to be free from the spidery claw leashing her crimson tresses to a lithe leg.

"I agree with ye, Mantus. That smool-brain be too valuable to Blue-lips after he got rid of that bug infestation. Too bad he can't get rid of all bugs! Like Konk's!" The oxen warrior resumed scoffing down half the table's share of meat with his massive fists, breaking only to burp at a groused Konk and clink down a handful of coin from under his thorned helmet.

"No fair, you know what Blue-lips plans are, ye spoiled! You's cheating!" Vlor considered parting with four pieces from his teal vest, but at an epiphany refused to put any down. "You's lyin', And cheating! I won't have it!" He yelled at his friend left, to which Mantus denied that he did not know everything.

Vlor scratched his black sideburns, hearing a clashing noise that shifted from the dimness. The buddy swordsman's nose twitched, blank eyebrows sprang up. "There they are, get them!" The silent elbow bump and an observant twist from Vlor's bubbly eyes were all it took for Mantus to give the cry for attack. His rising fist slammed on table near his mug, his barmaid's abandoned scream was heard thumping to the floor and to unconsciousness.

"They've seen us!" Niddler let out a piercing squawk as he flapped out the door in the trail of his human friends. Four misfits and company ran heedlessly away from Bloth's reckless vandals. Mantus and his troop hunted, grunting and shouting threats. "I swore I'd never go back here again but...this way!" Niddler flew ahead, leading the way down a deserted alley. Long obsolete monkeybird-cages and confines littered the way. The drawn swords of the evil quintet whizzed past as the Wraith's crew curtailed a romp.

"Chungo-lungo, why does bad luck follow us wherever we go?" Ioz stretched up from his collapsing knees, coughing as he muttered.

"I wish I knew..." Through panting huffs Ren ticked his vision around the edge of the alcove, making sure danger had certainly left. His slanting blues swung right to left. After clearing, he stepped toward the nether part of the city. Evening flares were becoming visible as shops stayed open. Unlike other towns, Pandaawa market did not close at dusk.

"Bloth must be around here, somewhere. Better stay out of the open." Tula parsed in movement and mind. Her toe hit a block of something hard. When she glimpsed at her foot, she could see a peculiar chest that seemed to contain something inside of it. "Ioz? Ren, come look! You know...we could use a spare clevis, someone left it behind..." She beckoned them both over, this time Ren was the first to attend. Ioz simply twisted.

"What is this? It's inscribed with something...it says Z? M...Q?" Ren bent over to scrutinize the wooden lock with confusion. With a browsing eye he made out the symbols of initials etched onto the lid of the opened trunk. Strokes were proportional as if some animal had carved the pulp out of the lid with claws. Contained inside was a few packs of tinderwood with a respective cindersand tray, and an unused clevis. Underneath the pristine kit laid exactly sixteen pieces of gold. Why was it lying in the middle of the walkway?

"And that would mean leave it alone. No man knows who the pirate Z.M.Q. is, but you don't steal from him. He knows all. Come along, Ren." Ioz's cheery melody soon followed as he pushed Ren away by the back of the shoulder. Tula withdrew with an unsure turn of the neck.

Ioz momentarily veered away from the group, planning to pick up some provisions. He heard a scratching solicitor beckoning to him.

"Hello, pirate. You look like the type who appreciates a good deal. Care to offer a price?" The hoggish tone pitched. Ioz planned to snub away the vendor, until he saw what was displayed in his hands. Two greedy black-eyes poised in a smile.

Solia hummed past the facade of an abandoned tavern to munch upon a stolen Pandaawa-Pear while the racketeer was occupied. She caught the unwitting attention of a hiding spectator. Is that thieving wench who I think it is? Without words, the eyes and angular lips quivered. "Ioz's sweet blood has grown into a sea-man's fantasy true. Hoy kyar." Mantus whispered while his sneer stretched to the shapely lass and scrabbled for other parts to covertly prowl on his enticed desire. Solia skipped happily off into the suburbs.

Unnoticed behind a crate of bottles, a winged figure peaked out. The face slowly made itself into a cunning grin as it loaded a minga-melon in the crate.

Ren walked into a weaponry store, the silver bell tolled upon his entry.

"I feel guilty leaving Ioz alone while Bloth's men are on the streets...what if he needs us?" Tula regret her decision of choice pathways as the many creatures strange and small within the emporium's zoo grew rowdy with instinctive sensory for ecomantic energy approaching.

"Welcome! Everything is for sale, from the dagron-hide shields to the turtlefly-lyres. We also carry a variety of species, including dexolors in tanks...gaizers in pistols...memorats with perches...landsharks with fang-bait and of course, glowfish. Take a look at our fine wares, travelers." The long-whiskered fellow of the huntsman outlet greeted his new customers as he lifted a batch of living dolphichickens strung by the feathery heel down from the ceiling with a great hook. Wild bawls and hisses filled the showroom with life. Amphecytes splashed out of water and stuck to walls to leech on sea-leeches. Table-crabs scurried where the visitors could easily cart their bags. Squealing nycra-launchers were stacked in the vending machines beside the sea-zebra corral. The fouls settled among a swimming hutch above as the royal shuffled to the counter.

"Don't worry. We're right across town, if he needs anything he'll just find us in here." Though seldom did anything go as intended for the Quest's seekers, nothing could damper on Ren's positive mood as he passed the gritty hilt to the owner.

"Haven't seen one like this one, she's a beauty but rare. Do you want the trim, boy?" The odd-eyed conjurer rolled a boggling iris over the brand of the metal, creaking his bat-face.

"No, just the edging." Ren politely declined.

"Forty-two drabuls." The batty proprieter charged.

"Ay chunga, this is not something I can do every six-moons. Do you take change for glawn?" Ren paid the craftsman and left the shop, Tula ambled endwise.

The brigade walked on back to their destination after finishing the chores. The team yet again prepared to set sail and busily loaded stock and necessities into the Wraith's hold.

"Minga-melons, check. Water canisters, check. Borca paste, check. More minga-melons...check. Hey wait, where are the lighting supplies?" Niddler chirped off, currently in charge of inventory as he craned around for the missing items.

"Right here, Niddler." Ren affirmatively granted the monkeybird as he propped up some cindersand and lighting twigs. "Though I doubt we'll be needing them, we're not going anywhere dark." The positive man followed up as he meandered to the wheel of the ship.

"It's always good to be prepared, Ren. With this Quest, it would do us a farthing favor to be more prepared than we are." Ioz smiled as he calmly inspected the deck for malfunction.

"Umm excuse me, Ren if you want Lus-nayi and I to patch the sail we'll need more supplies." Joiquiva offered her aid as that of her kin.

Ren checked a satchel one final time and plucked out a sticky item resembling a palm-sized clam. He inspected it, he did not buy such a thing. He knew Tula didn't either. "Ioz, what is this?" He interrogated the money-hungry bandit with suspicion. Niddler dashed swollen circles of green on it with recognition, his expression twisted in traumatic anguish.

"That's our newest source of income!" Ioz alerted with a jolly success as he snatched the clam away from Ren. "Ay jitata, by the golden peaks of Mount Meridol, these are rare in Pandaawa. Expensive here..." He prolonged with a devious grin. "I can't imagine how much gold this baby'll fetch someplace like Janda-town!" He chuckled with witty jubilation.

"You didn't steal it, did you?" Ren tried to pry as Tula gathered by his side from storing away goods.

"Not exactly." Ioz fluctuated and tore his eyes away from the noble.

"Ioz..." Ren reprimanded with obvious annoyance.

"Hey, I'm a pirate, if I want to steal, I'll steal! I didn't steal it anyway...but at the price he offered it was a steal!" Ioz testily claimed.

"Ren!" Niddler squawked with dismay. "That's a Pandaawa Screaming-Clam!" He revealed with absolute dread.

"A what?" Tula gently asked him, sensing pain from the monkeybird.

"A..." Niddler began with a gulp. "Whipping clam!" He cried out with agony. "Only monkeybirds can hear them, they were used to control us in Pandaawa because of the sound they make!-Not that many were needed because many of the monkeybird slaves were so hungry all the time they did anything they were told! Those things can be heard for as far as we can fly!" Niddler wailed out with a panic, screeching and strikingly distressed.

"Huh?" Ioz questioned in something of surprise, his sloe eyes raised with his brow. He opened up the husk and Niddler flew in circles around the craft in a berserk madness, shrilling horribly like never before. The clam made no sound, but he shut it at the monkeybird's reaction. Niddler calmed down, but still agitated his wings with a disturbed bearing. "So all that gold is mine for this little trinket." Ioz selfishly chuckled. Tula slanted her mouth to criticize with reproach.

"Ioz, can I take a look at that?" Ren appealed calmly, pacing up to the opposite helmsman.

Ioz hesitated, and then handed the creature to to his partner. "Alright but don't lose-hey! Noy jitat!" Ioz blustered out as he agreed at a whim, but he could have flipped. Ren chucked the shell overboard with a fling of the arm. Tula grimly giggled. "What did you do that for! We'll be out a bunch of gold now! Just because the monkeybird doesn't like...Ay chunga!" He raved and swore with chagrin.

"Now it's back where it belongs." Ren guilelessly ushered to the enraged sailor, with a sagacious smile planted on his lips.

"Well, Ren, there's a problem now. Our sail is still not seaworthy because Ioz spent all our repair money on his greedy habits." Tula sighed as she gaped above at the tattered fabric, then jutting eyes to the scowling buccaneer.

"Don't blame me, you said you would handle it!" Ioz contested with an acrimonious flux. "I wouldn't have even spent anything at all if it wasn't your idea to divide the pile! I chose to use my share to make a worthwhile investment, I could have sold it back for double! How was I supposed to know it was a chunga-lungan monkeybird-torture-device?!" His temper churned at the nagging heckler, he scrunched his fists and flit his arms spiritedly under the breeze.

"Open your eyes, Ioz, not everyone with a sale in town is legit!" Tula scathed at the rankled pirate. The sides unconsciously erupted into a quibble, not paying note to the near-traumatized avian seeking Ren's assuagement.

"That's enough fighting for now." Ren staunchly muscled in. He nestled Niddler who was consoled by clinging to his knee. "We've spent all our gold, there must be some way we can help this situation." He tweaked his chin as he pondered a way out of the spot.

"Well, we can always steal more sail-cloth." Ioz casually shrugged.

"No." Ren's stern syllable was all that needed to be told. He cast a sharp eye at the all-too-eager swashbuckler. While the trio pinged ideas about, Niddler crept for an article glinting in the sunlight that attracted attention. Upon nigh inspection, he brushed the fish-skin.

"At least we won't be too warm while we wait, these frocks the native peoples left behind seem weather-resistant." Wrapped in a briny hide, Niddler attempted to put a positive spin on the perspective.

"Niddler! That gives me an idea!" Ren's savvy smile lit up.

By nightfall, four adventurers and two joined in a feast at a hutch inside a local suburb of the New Pandaawa district.

"Great, now I'm going to reek of yuugla intestines for weeks." The bedraggled sailor complained, with discomfort he readjusted the helm of the large ocean-fare.

"Well we have to if we want to show them respect!" Ren forewarned, shushing the intrusive tone of the partner to his left. "We mean that with all wellness to Sultan Zombie Jello Chicken, we hope he will grant Pandaawa many more rains of Kelp Stools. We thank him for our generosity on this bountiful occasion of Moon-Matrimony-Awareness-Century-Sequence-Day." He compassionately engaged the hosts, not letting the stale vapors bother him.

"We are pleased to join you on a normal evening." The lead neighbor welcomed the entourage to the dining table. They spat out surfing trunks and tried them on for fit. Then, they passed them around the table.

"We wouldn't even be in this situation if you hadn't spent all our sail-money on trying to get rich quick!" The ecomancer griped to Ioz with sorely crossed arms.

"Noy jitat, I knew it was too good to be true." Ioz tipped the skinned hat away from his face with a modest affirmation.

"Sure you did." Tula unwillingly huffed.

"I don't know, the smell is making me hungry." The monkeybird begged to differ, inhaling a bountiful whiff as he tipped his scale-hat. "Can't we eat any yuugla while we're here?" He petitioned for more on his plate, picking at the measly offering of Goija-leeks and Roots.

"Yuugla is overhunted, Niddler. I'm sure the native Pandaawans catch them by natural means, we can't just take their food supply. We came here to get material to make a new sail, which we're doing." Tula reasonably stated their objective to the hungry teammate.

"We are all neighbors here. The evil people...they throw our food away before we're finished eating!" The civilians behaved as if they could hear her, though Tula was convinced they did not. On cue, the herds of sieging invaders began pouring into the fleshy hut arisen by shrub stakes and stealing nourishment from the generous Pandaawans.

Niddler was stricken with an aghast gasp. "Ren, we have to stay, we can't just let such an injustice exist!" Niddler tugged on Ren's tunic, petitioning to lend a hand.

"We can try." Ren's stunned face didn't fade when he coughed from a kick up of dust left by the walloping strangers bearing feet of yuugla heads. Half-eaten plates and dishes were knocked over. Sea-turkeys and pudding-cups were bagged from the platters as the remaining scroungers spun off to dump them into the ocean.

"Stop that!" Niddler screeched and spread his wings in what he imagined was a pitiful venture at driving away the ransacking party. He was fully astounded when the assaulters reversed at him.

"It's an Anchor-eating Mogoop! Run away and never come back!" Niddler blinked indignantly when the bizarre raiders high-tailed with horrific screaming when he opened his beak.

"Maybe we should tell you how to reach Monkeybird City." Ren cleverly gleaned in for their host's sake.

"Hmph! And to think I helped you figure out how to help us!" The insulted monkeybird huffed, but Ren discreetly shushed him.

"Chieftain, if you would, we'd like to know if there's more of this you can give us." Ren diplomatically presented the pelt, smiling openly.

"Yes! Yes! Yes!" The Chief and the hyperactive villagers stood up and flapped bent arms, raising their shovels high as they bobbed their yuugla-helmets and yowled all at once. They lifted round gourds, placing them into mesh nets that were hung about the room. They then began chanting while arming themselves with spears and driving them into the ground. The most esteemed of the masses brought forth more hides by the twos, and a third secured each guest into the scaly hammocks to run them outside.

"Noy jitat! One at a time will do!" Ioz howled as he was carted away, entirely thrown off nerve.

"Excuse us! Gotta run!" Ren rapidly covered the helmsman's sore manners that ruined their gracious departure of the gods.

The rope to the dock had been cut and Ren charged for the insufficiently pleasant sea under the twilight skies. Niddler already became occupied with keeping the voyage free of the treacherously-inky waters from belting the path. "Dark water off the starboard bow!" Ren shouted to his helper as he devised a strenuous turn against the rough tide. "Where are Joiquiva and Lus-nayi? They were supposed to be keeping a lookout." He searched eyes for the absent helpers but neither was found.

"I'm trying!" Niddler cawed in return. The dark water crept up the partition, he needed to scrupulously hover in between a wall of ooze and lower the Treasure below with his toes to have any luck in making it vanish. The startling noise contacted the listening-range from the rear as Ren curved his neck back around. The imperial lad spotted the turbulence in the horizon, clearly visible from his station.

"Ren, a ship!" Tula scouted into the distance with sun-shielding eyes, alerting the leader of the imminent danger.

"I see it already." Ren confirmed in response. The ship was barren, leaner than their own and much smaller than the main enemy's fortress. It was comprised of an accustomed build. It could have only been one thing.

"Konk." Ioz berate with revilement. "Jitatan kreld-eater." He heeded the showing trouble through squinted eyes.

"If Konk is here, that means Bloth is." Niddler furthered with an unfortunate manner. He whined, cleaning more dark water from the ship's determined avenue.

"Look though, he's alone! Like he was before." Tula pointed out. Driven with leafy specks in focus, she surveyed the vessel tailing through the ocean.

"Usually sea-pigs come in droves." The swarthy buccaneer nonchalantly tagged on to her comment.

"Alone or not, he'll catch up to us if we stay on course. We'll have to change route until we can get him off us." Ren directed as he hassled with a difficult turn, swinging too close from a blotch of black brine. "Niddler! Portside!" He yelled out, the goodly monkeybird flapped wings to the other side of the railing. The assailant ship in the stretch increased in propulsion, it kept steady until a broader silhouette of a creature had been sighted lifting off from the stern.

"He has a dagron with him! He's coming for us! Ay jitata, that barnacle-basted gantha-pig!" Ioz scornfully shouted from the deck. Ren however appeared to have already noticed the catastrophe.

"You know what to do, Ioz. I won't leave Lus-nayi and Joiquiva unaccounted for, you'll have to defend the ship. Use the lighting twigs to send a signal!" Ren severely rumbled as he focused dots on the nearing tide-breaker of the North side of Pandaawa. He swept definitive enough to shore, ultimately hitting fair water. He signaled to the switch, which would release the glider. After dropping anchor he recited the order, though it drove him to anxious lengths to think on it, just recently experiencing those bad memories flush back into his spirit.

"Let's go!" Ioz motioned to Tula and Niddler, Ren had already left the wheel and mobilized into position. Tula was now gripping on to the beam that would keep them upright. The glider would soon sail to a Kuunda-decided location upon the verge of land. Niddler flipped the handle and the glider shot off in angle of the beach. The three ascended powerfully higher up into the air. The wind swung above as they begun to slack, the avian tracking close behind. It soared with a dive and crashlanded into a thicket of dense brush. Konk was nowhere to be seen.

"I guess he's not coming after us." Only Tula pronounced as she glared at the hiding currents from where they came.

The bunch rose from the ground, dusting themselves off. The four tramped for the center of the sector of Pandaawa where they had grounded, the villa of the monkeybirds. The campaign required only a short trek inland before being greeted by fabulous wood-constructed huts lining the treetops. Almost immediately they were recognized and welcomed by the winged inhabitants of the village.

"Friends! It's so good to see you again!" They had been received by the goldenrod monkeybird, Kellon, one of the monkeybird elders who now started to show his age, moreso than before. "Niddler, how have you been faring?" He addressed to the fellow aviator in the league, granting him an exclusive salutation. Niddler flew down from a closeby Minga-tree, where he had claimed a snack.

"I've been good, Kellon. Though, a little roughed-up under the feathers." The red monkeybird replied as he patted spots of worn and scruffy feathers that were mangled by the consistent action.

"That's good to hear." The benevolent monkeybird returned.

"Actually, we were hoping you might give us rest. We fled from our ship and we were brought here to seek the 11th Treasure of Rule. It seems to be somewhere within the borders of Pandaawa." Ren explained with a cordial style.

"Ren! It is very nice to see you again." The prince rolled his attention about as he heard the majestic voice of the regal who welcomed him. Striding to him, he observed the lavendar-plumed complexion of the Monkeybird Queen. The younger brood at her side had grown since moons ago, fledging into a beatific chick. "What brings you to Pandaawa, Young Prince and Friend of Monkeybirds?" The Queen enunciated to her guest, her arm around the ever-silent youngster who was ordained to take her place.

"Pardon us, your Majesty." Ren hailed respectfully to her. "We were brought to Pandaawa in hopes of finding the 11th Treasure of Rule. We would be honored if you would grant us a temporary rest, until we can return to our voyage." He provided his burden as he courteously besought her refuge.

"Queen!" Niddler greeted her by laying down his melon and bowing his head. He promptly ceased his beak-smacking motion.

The little Queen stirred lightly as if bemused by the newcomers and cooed at Ren. "Which direction does the Compass point?" The parental Queen of Pandaawa discerningly pursued of the visiting regent. "Niddler!" The mature Queen adjured the callow monkeybird of crimson specifically. "How have the seas been treating you, my dear child?" The Queen perused as she smiled in his direction.

"I have been well, My Queen." Niddler acknowledged, deferring to her with passive reverence. The Queen returned a smile. Ren then took over from where Queen's prelude previously ended.

"We believe it points North, but we are not certain of the location." Ren soberly detailed. The monkeybird princess allayed noises and reached, trying to grab in Ren's way as if curiously wondering who or what he was.

The senior Queen craned a soft gaze to soothe the juvenile flyer. "Yes dear, this is Ren. He will soon rule greatly just as you will someday." The Monkeybird Queen beamed while petting the junior Queen on the head. She dallied to tenderly boost up the apprentice, letting her own a better view of the prince and then she placed her back down. "Come along, I think we may be of help to you." The Queen diverged to the rear of the party, then she motioned for them to follow.

The loyal crew walked directly to the inner sanctum of the monkeybird village, Queen and her successor leading the way. Through a designed log pathway of the Queen's palace she guided them into a hallway both farflung and silent as well as neglected, until she strolled to the end of the tunnel. There at which she stopped. The edge of the alley lined with a thin stretch of paper, spread up on the wall. She undid the corners used to hold the material and wavered it loose. "This, we believe, may be what you speak of." She withdrew to the quartet behind her as she passed them the curling map, unrolling it to gander at.

The map showed an area of ten tiny and virtually nonexistent islands an outstanding stretch, North of Pandaawa. One of which, the golden-headed leader familiarized to be the cay containing the Swamp of Sorrows and the one they closely passed through. "I've never heard of this place before." Ren conveyed, gleaming at her with his astoundment.

"It is a place not normally found on any maps. You may have heard of the main island through myth or lore, but it is uncommonly known the additional nine islands of the chain exist as well. It is an area so well hidden, not even many of the most knowledgeable sailors have heard of it. Only Pandaawa natives solely know anything about the subsistence of the Ruunta Cays or where the dinosaurs dwell, and much of the area has been lost due to the plague of the dark water. Our scouts have made basic maps of the area but they are for the most part, unexplored. It may be where your Treasure is located-I obtained your second Treasure of Rule from one of your father's captain's who hid it from Jargis in the Ruunta Cays for a time, so near to Monkeybird City it is." The Queen composed with inclusive detail. "Needless for me to say, you will encounter danger." She finished her telling to them. The Future Queen cuddled by her waist, peeking up with nosy eyes and not at all understanding the commotion going on.

"Danger?" Niddler gulped, he had just-about finished a half of his snack of minga. Queen nodded an agreement.

"In that case, we'll set course soon as our chief navigator returns. I'm afraid we can't stay here long because we were being pursued on the way here." Ren started to tensely define, he paused. "Thank you very much for your hospitality, your Grace." Ren politely bowed his head in respect and proposed to collect back at the area the troupe had come.

"Your ship is safe, friends. When our people heard you had arrived they made sure to keep it close to our port." The Queen offered satisfactorily as she assuaged his concern. "May you have fortune on your journey Ren, I hope to one day see you when you are King of all of Octopon." She bid him farewell.

Ren swiveled to her and gleamed. "We are most gracious, your Majesty." Ren thanked the Queen magnificently and bended in a sign of favor. He and his circle pattered to leave through the organic passageway which would lead them back to their transport, and where they would set sail for their newest venture.

"Can't we stay? We haven't been able to rest very much at all." Niddler moaned, manifestly pressed and tired.

"Patience Niddler-" Ren stopped to say more to his monkeybird companion Tula was about to express her opinion one way or the other but they were interrupted by an approaching pandemonium.

"Monkeybird City is being taken over by a plague of worms!" The desperate scream echoed from every corner of the nesting breach. The conjunction of gasps followed.

"Why does something always have to happen?" Niddler irked in response before spelling into an alert. The slimy creepers were bunching up every wall and floor. Purple residue was oozing through every pore.

"You must go! There's no killing them, they've been coming whenever they want like this for weeks!" The Queen sorrowfully vaunted forward to urge her visitors out.

"These aren't any ordinary darva-worms!" Ioz pounded the face of his sword into the back barrier, slapping vermin to no avail. To the stun of all, the pests only proceeded to transform into lumps of gray.

"I don't feel...able. Evil." Tula shuddered from a woe of hindrance, her eyes became like wilting droplets. When she staggered, Ren cast the glassy spiral against the gook. For once, the Treasure was impaired. Like the Imbibers, there was no cure.

"Noy jitat! I don't believe there isn't a way to stop them! Queen, we will stay." Ren swore from frustration coursing through words. He scanned for any valid scheme in the time he was given. Gray and violet blanketed wood-pulp like the stars above the ocean.

"You have to go now, your Quest is too important! They will go away on their own! You must stay with Ren, Niddler, and complete his Quest!" The Queen directed as she was about to swoop away to secure the supreme youngling under the shield of her wingspan. Sounds from the Farming Fish and Zombie-Jello-Chicken Fanatics filled the void and brought with them the malodorous reek of yuugla innards. The grubs began to weaken as the Monkeybird royal picked up her shielded beak.

"Ren, I have to do what Mother says, no matter what." Ren listened to Niddler's sincere plight, having at last conceded with a dunk of his lip after the duct of vines rattled and he was stricken backward, onto his rump. Odor from scale and gill parts shattered nostrils when the monkeybirds made mutual allies in the fishhead-wearing devotees.

"Queen!" Cawed an invocation from the immense tree-burrow, a monkeybird glided into their zone. The birdlike figure emerged as a cluster of vibrant purple feathers from the long hallway. "Invaders!" The plum defender screeched out. "We can't hold them off!" Dello's distress cry wheezed. It was transparent that he had carried flight for a considerable measure in warning.

Ren's mouth dropped as he swerved toward his friends, who too alarmed with resolve and prepared to spring into action. Two more monkeybirds swooped into the tube.

"No!" The Monkeybird Queen engaged the team as they readied for battle. "We will help you, friends!" She communicated with firm intention and flew up to perch on Tula's shoulders, scooping her off the ground. "Keep eye on the Future Mother of Us All!" She reserved to the two flurrying attendants who had just decamped downward from the sky. Dello fluttered to mount the immature Queen's shoulders and aspired her upward.

"Yes Queen! Long live our Queen!" The two devoted monkeybirds obeyed in accordance, hotfooting into the adit to guard the fledging aristocrat.

"Here I was hoping to have a nice bed to sleep in for once." Niddler complained in a chatter and hopped upon Ren's mantle to fly him out of the hallway.

The flapping of dual shades of lavender feathers and garnet-cloaked wings persevered from the hollow. The colorful avians and passengers whooshed over lavish flora and steep canopies of trees, stopping for nothing. The shore advanced into focus at last and the three aviators and their ferry floated down upon the sand. The lightless skies were littered with the orange beacon of fiery torchlight and the air full of heavy grunts and many shouts. Various reckless and mangy gaping-ones upon the seaboard swung weapons and sprouted arrows, aimed at a company of airborne primate-fighters. One of the rascals was recognizably short and fat. He rooted on the beach on one unbalanced leg, slashing away with a sharp and crude incisor at an attacking flit of plumage. He wrung his head to spike Ren an arrogant glare.

"Konk!" Ren uproariously shouted out, he ripped his weapon from his belt the moment he had touched down on land.

"And his smilge-tossing sea-trash!" Tula atrociously finished Ren's hearken. They started toward the pirates who were causing so much trouble but were repelled by the great wingspan of lilac feathers flying to face them.

"Stop!" Queen ordered aflutter. The four looked on with confusion at first, they then saw the monkeybirds were not only holding the raiders back but for some reason unclear, the enemies seemed to be retreating to a peculiar station. Puzzlement fell over the group, the Queen waved lower to touch down at their width.

Out of the blackened night and behind an abysmal tuft of trees, a movement in the sky began to take place. It first appeared to be a turbulent storm cloud hastily approaching, but it moved too swiftly and too low to the bank. Vibrations shot out over the sandbar, the adventurers felt their limbs quiver from their shaking surroundings. They watched in awe as it grew larger and fuller, moving swiftly closer to them until the form of the behemoth of bones could be distinguished. The Maelstrom hauled near to shore as if it were about to disembark, but the group noticed the movement seemed to be halted by loud voices rebounding from the deck. Only with much adversity could the upheaval be observed but the focal range did not prove to be impossible. The commotion aboard deck had been apparent, echoes rived from the construct of wood and marrow.

"Hurry up with that ramp, you smool-brained slugs!" The sound of a decrepit form impatiently gnashed from the forlorn tier. He sheltered a whip in his possession. "Especially you, wench!" He cracked the whip and it connected with a few drudges who were towing up the grandeur gangplank of bone-board, preparing to slam it to the seaside below. In between them a deficient figure, who greatly contrasted with the ambiance winced in pain as the swash made contact with her back. Though her eyes were blinded with ache for a time, her sight restored in one instant. She presented a much more delicate essence than the grunts surrounding her. Tan and platinum stood out, vaguely familiar. The features weren't easily mistakable, though she had decidedly endured tremendous abuse. Bright peacock contacted with the dire regent, who's eyes could have connected but did not fast enough.

"It's...Jazhea! There has to be some way!" Ren shuddered with skylit eyes that widened in reproach, his awestruck lip trembled.

"This isn't your fight! We have to move before those things wriggle a draft to the Wraith." Ioz glanced uneasily at Ren and as he watched in revulsion the scene playing out above and from the coastline.

"Lus-nayi was being attacked by bilge-slugs! We fled our beds and they came with us, we noticed the Treasures wouldn't work on them!" Joiquiva finally caught up with the cluster of carnage as she yanked her worn-out sister from the skirmish. What did she say?

"So this is the choice I have to make?" Ren was discontinued by inadequate judgment, Bloth knew it tore his nature to make a decision between fellow humans.

Jazhea shot her captor a glare as if in rebellion, not wishing to do what she had been ordered. The warden drew closer to her, brandishing his lash. Bloth paced back and forth along the platform and watched with pure impatience the wormy fellow who brutally seized the slave's shoulder. "Nervy girl! You will do as I say, unless you'd like me to tell Bloth you would rather be the next meal for the Constrictus!" The frail crook hissed dangerously at her. Mantus pivoted away from the woman momentarily, still retaining his hand in a dominating crush on her shoulder. He seemed to be glimpsing restlessly at the grandiose captain, who occupied a growing interest in his standpoint. The blond girl glowered at him.

Bloth ceased from his striding to catch an eye at the two persons and tromped toward them. Mantus backed up cautiously as he bore upward with unease at the towering master, who warningly blasted a cold gaze at him. "Is there a problem, Mantus?" Bloth roughly growled in supervision of the skinny character who was lesser than him.

"Of course not, Bloth!" The subordinate stuttered temporarily and then averted to raise his whip at the offending captive. "This rotten wench won't follow orders but I'll break her, wretched Primus's Daughter!" Mantus gnarled, hoisting his violent arm high and about to beat the penalty down on her when the Pirate Lord dragged him away by the frock to compel him off his feet. Jazhea frightfully backed away.

"What did you say, Mantus? Did my ears hear what I think they heard? Do you mean to tell me this slave is an heir of that abominable old man? Sister of that inferior prince?!" Bloth demanded angrily, shaking his capture and wanting answer. Jazhea struggled against the shackles that bound to her wrists but stopped when the large villain had darted a scary leer of gold at her.

"Yes, Milord." Mantus stifled out, he beheld his sight on the arm harnessing him in apprehension. Never was it an easy job for the commander but he was well-off being charged with maintaining Bloth's high-seas empire and the privileges it often granted him. "The men heard her talking to one of the prisoners." He trembled aloud. "I meant to tell you, Lord, but I was interrupted by a crisis requiring me steer the Maelstrom clear of dark water, Sir!" He croaked out as he wobbled. Bloth dropped him with a wallop, his interest returning to the buffed prisoner.

"Is that so..." Bloth menacingly mused on as if perpending. Then he elevated the vulnerable mien of malachite up by the collar of her tunic and let out a crashing laugh. "You should have come to me immediately, fool, but that doesn't matter now. I will give her a royal...departure!" He thundered abound, grinning wretchedly as he wrought his blade over the wrestling damsel's throat. He pierced cruel goldenrod at the prince on shoreline as if he had just noticed him. "Meanwhile...take the Wraith!" He cunningly ordered to his men with a demolishing laugh, the sinister boom powered from far off. The warfare broke out then, rancid fumes seeped from fish-helmed-warriors that bludgeoned yuugla-footed food-dumpers with spears and slingshots. Minga-melons were tossed into the ocean, reclaimed to be launched at the hull of the Maelstrom by armored monkeybirds from above the beach and the sprinting townsmen, who were rebelling against past transgressions.

"Jazhea!" Ren screamed awfully, he forced the motion to vault toward her but he hesitated. Bloth's men were congregated alongside the Wraith, the pirate faction had been laid in such a structure that any would have no choice but to choose one or the other.

"There's nothing we can do, we have to escape from Bloth or he'll kill us all!" Ren heard Ioz holler with putrid horror, an edge behind. Ren anticipated his crew would try to tear him away.

"Booo! Boo!" Many outcries reveled from the ledge of the Pandaawa border. "Boo, Bloth! Go back to your own ship!" Numerous rioting lined the shoal, slivers of shining metal cracked and fizzled.

Ren numbed from a fleeing position where his only option would be to powerlessly watch as the blade rose overtop of her and smashed down. The scene forced him to discount the distant mincing of combat from what appeared to be ex-members of the Securitat and the New Pandaawans uniting with the Monkeybird Nation against Bloth's invading legion. He set his fleeting visual on Jazhea as the firmly wielded saber lopped to the deck, but the bony barrier of the hull obscured the scene. "No!" The junior royalty throttled with despair as he saw the girl disappear. Before he and Niddler could aim for their own withdrawing flight however, he saw the clamor of the terrific lass tapping hastily on the terrace and torpedoing off with a mounted lizard, arising from the monolith. Ren's awed but hopeful expression recovered. Several minions were floundering way to the bridge of the leviathan carcass as they lobbed for the exposed dagron pit.

"Pilot the dagrons! Catch that abhorrent wench and destroy her! Take the Treasures from the Wraith and kill them all! Bring me the heirs of that vile old man! I'll have their heads as a trophy!" Bloth rattled on in a volcanic rage as he pounded his fist against the edge of the large ship. "There's no way out, boy! Grimrot will see to it!" His foul words burst incessantly at the direction of Ren and where Jazhea's dagron skimmed the clouds. The lone reptile slammed through the wind for Ren and his company, many dagrons behind her started to ensue. Mantus had mounted one of the scaly creatures and hunted Jazhea's dagron with vigor.

"Squadrons three to seven! Delta formation on five! Reotozz!" Mantus mauled with an authoritarian command, snapping a neck to another pilot mounted on a reptile parallel.

"Jazhea!" Ren cried out to her from the beach. Ioz and Tula persisted close by, concentrating on the sky as if they were trying to determine her objective. To Ren's spooked fascination, he observed Jazhea still in wrist cuffs. She somehow piloted the beast with unencumbered skill, but she was flying too fast and too high up. "Look out!" He piercingly warned her of the approaching peril.

"Where's the Wraith?" Jazhea shouted out from the sky. She was climbing with the velocity of the zephyr until she could feel the slowing of her beast and every wingbeat in her eardrums, synchronized with the drum of her heart. For an extended instant, she was alone in the waves of the breeze. She controlled the airfield. "Go there!" Her imperative scantily sounded out as her dagron accomplished a steep climb and then a nosedive. Mantus zoomed in forthcoming pursuit, grinning at her with malice. The eel-prod touched a micro-instant away from Jazhea's dagron, enough to make Jazhea helplessly bump forward and lock around the lizard's neck with only her legs. She pressed to freeze in this position for as long as the steed would contend, she did not lose her grip. Ren stared, dizzying under the sky before him. He debated, unable to sever himself away before then tearing to where the cutthroats began to zone en masse.

"Chungo lungo! She's one jitatan rudderless dagron-pilot!" Ioz floored, impelling as he witnessed the unbelievable performance and scrambled Ren away. "Do as she says!" He hollered to Ren from his angle. The zestful pirate bounded for a clump of trees where the Wraith had been docked and kept secure.

"I don't think she has a choice! We have to leave now, Queen can't keep us covered for long!" Tula commented through gaps as she scorched away with willpower in her lungs. She plied to the tail of the party, only shrinking to peer back at the Monkeybird Queen who had taken flight with the rest of her people as they were no longer being attacked by Bloth's troublemakers.

The stinger split at Jazhea from the rocketing dagron again, it once more missed by a mere fraction. Mantus's gruff sounding warcries could be heard from the airzone as he deftly tried to corral the rebelling beast. She yowled as if her vision were blurried and she could no longer see where she was going. The avoiding dagron had been urged to dive into the current below to dodge. The reptile vanished into the blue waves.

"All this running! Please tell me there will be something to eat when we get back!" Niddler yawped with intense displeasure, waddling ahead with a carted stomach.

"Prince Ren, it is my pleasure to kill you! My name is Reotozz!" The semi-elegant intrusion accosted on the senses of the evaporating trailblazers. The Securitat-rider bearing a revealing helmet floated down on a dagron to felicitously gesture a bow.

"Ay jitata! What's with him?" Tula sissed with a swirl of a stance.

"I think we should worry about that later, Niddler." Ren stepped hindmost with a draft of a blade and a humdrum word.

"Not if I have anything to say about it!" Ioz charged forward to slam-kick the encroaching foe.

"Back with you, pirate! I'll make sure my employer Liege Mizzen-Conquest meets all of you!" Reotozz rushed at the fray with a cutting broadsword and a Starfishuriken. He chucked the spinning asterozoa and it splatted into a trunk of a tree. He twirled the rapier in a centrifugal motion above his head and hurled it at Ioz's heart.

"No you won't!" Tula pushed in the way, creating a defense of bramble. Reotozz's razor hem ensnared in the organic net. Dagron-cadets were submerging and pillaging a roadway to the jetty complacent to the Wraith.

"Quick! The catapult, behind the Nesting Hutch!" The prismatic monkeybird alarmed, pointing to a looming bulk that was rooted a slew of paces to the counter channel. The crew raced to the fringe, which housed an assembly of twig dwellings to wind back a scooped trajectory. The oppressive stalk ticked into place with the throbbing fingers of a quad of wayfarers, then the switch bolted into a tuft of ample sedge. Loads of spiderlike air-occupants began puffing out and gliding into a convergence on Bloth's pirates.

"Noy jitat! It's the Bameme! Let's get out of here!" The furious men screamed, remounting the battle steeds and moaning as the windy arachnids continued to gratingly chomp their chosen prey.

"This won't be the last you see of Reotozz!" Reotozz yelped, appallingly turn-tailing. The cinder-bearded guard scrabbled on the reptile's back and pounded into the night haze, an excitable giggle perniciously retreating from him.

"'Evening gents!" Ren barged through the prolonging knaves by the Wraith with an effective clout, enjoined by his chums in a bonded row. They fluxed into a serpentine trail, running up the waterline.

"Huh?" Niddler crinkled his eyes behind him as he took aback at a fifth accompaniment to their line.

The four quickly clambered aboard the ship, undoing the loose fastening to the shore. It cast off amid waters speckled with black. Tula and Ioz scanned the skies for any sign of the solo rider.

"Noy jitat, she's in danger again!" Ren verbally panicked from the wheel, steering for the open sea with an unsettling turmoil.

"We know she's out there. We can look for her when we're not under attack from Dagrons-of-Bloth!" Ioz followed up, his expression arid. "At least the Maelstrom can't get through all this smilge." He remarked over flat-palming the bar on the protective siding of the envoy, his eyes focused at the entrenching pools of filth. "Ouch! Noy-jitata-chungo-lungo!" He sat up to glare as he hit the floor fouling, having slipped a foot on the lacquered boards. Niddler scuttled past with the orphans as they rolled a minga-melon and gladdened like school-girls. Joiquiva and Lus-nayi cuddled the blushing avian on the bridge.

"I guess I have to be myself..." The abstract tune of makeup washing off dealt the saddest interloper boarding the Wraith.

"And we have a new friend. Hello?" Ren rearranged his head to welcome the woman he saw chasing after the four pirates in the merchant's sector as she flung herself over the hull.

"Yo-ho-chukka-ho-wa! Now that's what I call a wo-wait." Ioz flipped his head at the curious commotion, impeding his comment.

"We're probably only friends now because that shriveled skip and his dock-cruising band of scum-bags dunked-and-swam me, but greetings. The name's Delta. Pandaawa calls me Miss Delta, of course. I'm looking for gold and rent. Don't mind me, I'll just take a barrel for my own, think of it as payment for my trade. Do you happen to have a facet I can borrow? I'm like a leviathan in the morning when I have to lay my head in enclosed saunas, I need to stay hydrated." The scarcely-covered outcast casually introduced herself as she picked from a barrel and began unloading the contents. Contrary to what Ren had glimpsed at downtown, she was actually an amphibious species. Delta's skin was smooth and comprised of turquoise and pink blotches of color, the tail of her curvy body was long like that of a jumping fish. Similarly, her fiber hair was high-tied on both sides of her sleek face and a salmon-toned frill surrounded her cheek bones.

"I know what trade you're in, you're a singing-wench. Sorry, there's no spare room on the Wraith for barnacle-crusted riffraff from port." Ioz marched over, intent on eliminating the scarified intruder from the board as she had slid one sinewy foot onto the rim of the planking roll.

"Then throw me overboard, pirate! I'd rather drown than go back to Pandaawa City!" Delta stood her ground with a tasteless shriek and did not leave her placement.

"Someone is going to go overboard, and fast! Ioz, get Lus-nayi and don't let Joiquiva go after her!" Ren excited with an agressive order to a vaulting Ioz when he alerted to what awaited at the top. In a mission to scout for dark water, Lus-nayi had wobbled to the highest point, the crow's nest. Wretchedly, she was trapped on the mast with a slug dancing along her contorting spine. The pair of dagrons blared as the midnight clouds rolled over the breakline. The oldest of the Quin twins froze her action from tips of her twiggy toes to the chilling sweat that dribbled from her fluctuating pools of red.

"No, older sister! Lus-nayi said it's him, he raided our village and she can't get down!" Joiquiva set her salute at the crimson robes of Lus-nayi under the moonbeam as she listened to shouting from desolation and hysteria.

"There's something wrong with that slug-it won't respond to my ecomantic control!" Tula strained to connect with the alien entity, but she hit a physical barrier which thwarted her effect.

"Sister Lus-nayi!" Joiquiva sorrowed among a deep downcast in her amber eyes. "We picked the right crew, but the wrong Quest to sail the twenty seas for..." She collapsed in the grief of her fallen honor as loosing her family to this horror was nothing to ever think of, contrarily Lus-nayi's hiding blink expanded like a supernova as unsteady bow-shocks pulsed from the tottering timber she clung to for life.

"Those are some brave orphans, boss, I can see why you liked that one of 'em so much." The brutal Strand showed a red-robed girl in trouble a once-over, flourished amusement induced the four-armed scorpion-rat to laugh with his superior cohort.

"Brave orphans, indeed." Mantus chuckled softly when he directed his dagron to hover over Lus-nayi's footing. He loaded a starzooka full and fired the first of many volleys of sea-star projectiles at the clawing twin. "But this one is done!" The commander seized the reigns of the beast, he stopped midway to lambaste such stirct commands. "When you board the Wraith burn their sails and lock the prisoners underneath the loading dock, pry the Treasure of Rule out of their greasy palms. Get Lus-nayi out of the way...and take her down." Mantus instructed in smooth tactics as he always was a swift pirate who had taken full advantage of his freedom to terrorize and steal as he pleased, so long as he accomplished his tasks for his Lord Bloth. "I'm going to slice you to pieces." His bloodthirsty challenge dotted a line straight to Lus-nayi's confronted stare as she arched to the quakes of the sea. Grimrot scaled the hull of the Wraith.

PART 2 - Terror of the Running Cay

Grimrot's vice mangled on the crumbling floor. Wood streaked with staining mildew and decayed.

"It looks like Grimrot will finish the Wraith before Mantus does." The rebounding clatter elevated among the shaky tidal-realm. Mantus's dagron barred Lus-nayi's release to the running tier. Vibrations of the tremoring mast reduced the girl's remaining strength to only her prodding nails as slack.

"I wonder...will these smool-brains abandon ship before that used-up wench smacks the black ocean, or will Grimrot let all of them sleep in dust first?" Mantus taunted in a side-by with Strand imminent to Lus-nayi. He left the scared hostage hugging to the only safety her thin smock of scarlet would provide.

"Ren, it's nighttime! If we don't find a way to cut him off...we're done for!" Ioz stampeded in reverse when the stable lumber festered beneath his boots and gradually chipped to sooty splinters. Ren swallowed a nervous lump when the skeletal fungus of Grimrot's skin decreased the area of panels that could be treaded on without stumbling to wreckage. Strand dove and captured a victim from the bending bulwark with one of his many limbs, flinging her to Mantus's reach.

"This maiden sea-cat is coming with me and I plan on taking my time with her, but if you cooperate and hand over the Treasures to me now I might just bring her back to you in one piece." With no emotion from his heart, the dangerous swordsman clipped Joiquiva inside his natty claws and stroked her spine as if he were about to wring her neck.

"It's been a long time, Mantus. Tie your dagron and face my sword like a man, if we were alone you wouldn't have a hold on us!" Ioz armed himself and muscled onto a surviving plank, with a daring madness he clamped his wieldy fists to a threatening chokehold. He hassled the master tactician to accept a deciding match.

"If I go down there to put you in your rightful place underneath the bilge-water, Ioz, both of us will be caught in Grimrot's fungus-not a risk I plan to take on this night." Mantus was ever serene when he desisted his tyranny of the compromised hull to strap Joiquiva to the scaly mane of his transport.

"Your ship is mine, to rot into futile soil!" Grimrot pounded his wormy fists of deterioration and breathed on the windlass clew, rusting it until breakage. He herded the shipmates to a deadend for Mantus's keeping, glowing fingers leaving no ground for any elusive boots.

Lus-nayi wouldn't begin to end the wail for her sacrificing sister and urged her sling-shot free to first aim it at the devil-spirit of Grimrot, as he grasped the riggings with a relentless havoc on all that yielded to Creation's great cycle. The compact framework continued to disappear.

"Make your decision soon, you might want to surrender before Grimrot fragments the Wraith's mainmast into powder." Mantus's warning drifted mercilessly among the dagron horde. Ren sweat with the Treasure in his ply as more of the deck dissolved. He was now in direct target of Lus-nayi's dart-sling, he mistakingly fortified the highest spar in the flap of his reptile's wings.

"You're going to have to rot my slippery skin before you can rot me, bone-breath!" Delta wove about the grooves the monster had laid in his demolishing waste, forfeiting a jar of shirry-urchin pheromone to the tumbling pelt. Grimrot chased her wolf-calls and she skipped fast over a sunken aperture. She hung on the ledge by her teal-blue fingers and pink ponytails as Grimrot tripped into the hole. The besieging cadaver washed out with the brisk rapids.

Lus-nayi set her poison-mark on Mantus to free her fellow orphan and as she clicked the tail the puffer inflated. She launched the chest-kill of the spiky fish, it's fins driving for olive flesh.

"Mantus, if I lose my ship to this dark-trap your head will be next...as a delicacy in the Constrictus's gullet!" Roars of wrath resurfaced before the lean fiend sulkingly rolled his head and spun Maelstrom-bound, narrowly evading an immediate end. Joiquiva dropped from the dagron.

"Close catch, huh?" Niddler plucked his paws on two lasses, granting them a gentle return to the bridge. Both twins had lost their placement from bad stations, a slug wriggled on the remaining bottom.

"And we've managed to contain the slug." Ioz relieved a huff when he caged the vermin with a single snap, he shut the leviathan-hide canteen and locked it closed-tight. "Now...for how to get rid of it." With a pant he stowed his hands out of the way and resumed his scour of sore waters.

"Wait! I sense something, from that direction!" Tula let out on insight as she sprinted to the bow of the ship, gesturing to an object shinning from the heavens and impending closer. The resulting creature scoured the air for their craft.

Jazhea's dagron aviated into nigh range and then it touched down on the deck of the Wraith. "That kreld-eater can't keep me down." Jazhea weakly scrunched out with a coarse grin as she dismounted, and soon fell over. She had amazingly enabled a maneuver back on to the dagron with her hands still manacled, which arrived as a shock. She appeared incomparably more frail than before, her clothes were very dingy and did not match the ones from when she had met the four travelers. Despite this, her eyes were still glimmering and fierce.

The Quin-Draconik sisters picked a slingshot each when Ioz had divided the spoils of Pandaawa, weapons slumped across the sundered slats. They made way for Jazhea, who pulled endlessly to try to lift Ioz's blade for feel. When she could not drag the steel off the ground, she tried a thin rapier without any luck.

"You can't even pick up a small weapon...how useless are you?" Jazhea stirred a brow at the distrusting shrug she received from the cranky navigator.

"Ioz, some wield swords and some fly dagrons. Be more accepting." Tula passed the grumpy buccaneer to greet their former guest, a strange aquaintance of Ren who had joined the Quest in Janda-town.

"Tula we want to thank you all for rescuing us again, if we help the crew that saves Mer with the Treasures of Rule and find the Guyfoo Capsule for our people we may very well restore Lus-nayi's honor in our home village." Joiquiva soothed Lus-nayi and her rattled wrists, which were beginning to ease out of throb and twitch. Lus-nayi and Joiquiva had lost everything yet their hearts had changed after all this shakedown of morale, something inside told them staying on this Quest would be every bit worth the dangers they would have to face.

"Ioz is working on it, the Captain of those pirates who raided your village left a lot of wreckage to our ship with one of his minions. You might able to help by retrieving some rope." Tula advised the devoted twins to search for assistance. Unfortunately, trails of cracked lumber remained with splinters and revealed the cellar underneath the maindeck wherever Grimrot had taken the foot of his corpse.

"Unless we want to keep the hatch to the bilge-shop Bloth made for us we need to start working and I'll need the emergency-supply wood, if we want to see any repairs to this bilge-mess by 'morn. Until then we better pray we don't see a sea-storm or any high-drifts. Ay chunga, it all needs to be fixed!" Ioz cursed in his difficult obstacle, unsuccessfully roping a pair of cords to a bind. He slammed a huffy boot on the floor marred in serpentine, breaking off more of the old surface.

"Where are we headed?" Jazhea directed to Ren, who pulled the controls triumphantly and caused the Wraith to frequently dodge about in the mottled surface. She sprouted from her locate.

Ren surveyed her with a stunned fascination for her ability to get away. "We're headed off in search of the 11th Treasure." The prince succored as he slowly unfolded the map the Monkeybird Queen had given him. "The islands." He answered her query, holding up the map with one arm. He could not hide a visual of astonishment when his mock sibling neared. "I think we should help free you though." Ren carefully proclaimed, a meager bit of disbelief still lacing his tone. "Ioz is an expert lock-picker. Perhaps he can help you out." Ren invited the prime swashbuckler next to him, who came forward.

"That's what I'm good for, huh, Ren?" Ioz jested sardonically but cheerily. He sharpened his onyx eyes with intent and worked on freeing the youthful dame of her chains.

Time passed and the irons around Jazhea's arms at last came free. Ioz relieved Ren of the wheel when the dark water began to return with a treacherous prevalence.

"You need to stay East of the Straits of Hedron bordering Pandaawa and farther North. I think Bloth is planning to ambush you there but I don't know details. I heard him talking to his commander concerning the dagron fleets. I was down in the kravidorm most of the time I was there, until I was brought out for work. I heard his brigmaster talking about it, too." Jazhea pessimistically warned the crew of the hazard, she seemed aloof. Inaudibly, she sighed. "I'm sorry Ren, but I wasn't able to return to the lighthouse. I saw something unusual glimmering on Bloth's ship so I turned back to warn you. Then...it was too late. I didn't know what it was, but it seemed to be something destructive. It was...gigantic. I hadn't seen anything like it before in my entire search for Vaecusa, even when passing over." She exposed the dreadful account. "Well, it must have been gigantic anyway, I don't think I could have seen it otherwise." She artfully noted.

"Something glimmering...does that mean, that's right?" Ren confirmed with severity. "Set course around the strait, Ioz!" He issued out the order straight away.

"I'll do what I can!" Ioz firmly resolved. He busied himself with evading the blotches of the oncoming evil-muck.

"I'm hard of sight, in terms of movement. I can't see anything that moves faster than a dagron can fly. It was why I almost wasn't able to save you when we were attacked by those leviathans, I only saw the maw cornering us at the last minute when it slowed down. A torchlight on the Maelstrom would be invisible to me, the raid on Octopon I was in when I was a girl compromised my vision. In my eyes I was crippled by a purple mist when departing out of the city through the swamps on the outskirts of the Harbor, and it caused exceptional effects and I...don't usually confide this in other people. Eventually..." Jazhea openly rendered, stopping cold as she tried to push further.

"That's a problem for you just because you're partially motionblind? Stay away from leviathans then, I'm no sea-snail but the twin moons will sink when I can run as fast as a dagron. Either way, you don't have to worry about us spilling. There's no way to make gold off of that, I'd bet you're well enough." Ioz essentially implied, overtly changing route in the trifled waters.

"There are still men who can run as fast." Jazhea wistfully illuminated, she fidgeted with a sleek necklace under her throat.

"And who can move faster than a dagron besides a leviathan? Bloth? I don't think so." Ioz sarcastically amused by the lean of an arm on his station. "We made it through the Swamp of Sorrows in one piece. We've met Farming Fish and Zombie-Jello-Chicken Fanatics and their monkeybird-fearing mateys, the Dunking Fish and Zombie-Jello-Chicken Fanatics, stopped Monkeybird City from being food for worm-plagues by getting they and their bilge-kreld reek to follow us there. Then we caused united warfare against the Maelstrom with all three and the Securitat. We were chased by dagrons, the orphans from Qui-Qua we found at Bentar isle were attacked and the ship is still almost-completely devoured from underneath us because a living fungus employed by Bloth so why have we stolen us more trouble in a gulf-spawn's sea-concert than Treasure or loot in our pockets? If anything weirder happens on this Quest, I swear we'll be sailing right into the...Ruunta-Triangle. Sweet mother of-" He slumped his head back until his eyes snapped to a provocation. "Rudder-foam paste! You're defiling our drinking water!" He couldn't constrain his animosity at Delta, who was soaking her water-resilient glands in the half-full barrel.

"I need to bathe in it to live. Keep your britches on, I'll give it back. Want to hear a song? I calm men by singing them happy melodies. Ay cha trab su lee kwa tuen kay soku...and it goes really well with my very intimate dance-number." Delta expectedly excused herself while stroking the two ponytails over her inner-ears with a bar of nycra sopa, the high-pitched vocals sung a pleasant shanty before diving her newt feelers back from the rim of the canister .

"Charming." Tula inflected her dry opinion of the voluptuous nomad.

"We're supposed to take pity on you just because you're sham-bait?" Ioz sincerely entertained displacing the amphibian half-breed over the ledge.

"She can stay as long as she's helpful. We'll be fine until we reach our next destination." Ren earnestly pardoned the twin-tailed freeloader, walking past as Ioz spitefully complained.

"Ren! Chungo lungo, I never get any say in this. Why does every single luckless wharf-rat we meet have to be our rescue-project?!" Ioz conspicuously griped, fickle in irritation toward the cagey newcomer. He could even tell Tula was neither pleased.

"Alright, I'll be helpful." Delta propped up and legged out of the barrel, making a brittle promise. "You wanna know something about those enemy pirates who are after you, right?" She approached Ioz, who was standing by the nearby station and expressed her willingness to assist.

"Of course!" Ioz's pitch flit, he panned his stare over her and waited. "Well? Tell us." He groaned from displeasure.

"Don't tell me you don't know protocol. I'm a free agent but this isn't a charity, pirate. Ten gold, if you please." Delta shoddily forked out her open palm with an advantageous smirk of her coral lips.

"Make that five. We'll pay for information." Ioz tossed her a small dittybag weighed down by a petty sum for the hearsay.

"Alright. Well you know that twiggy bum, leader of those cutthroat scum-buckets who skinned me? Well, 'is name's Mantus." Delta agreeably divulged as she counted her pieces of the asking price with her webbed mitts.

"I'm liking where this is going. Go on." Ioz crossed his arms while further interrogating.

"He planned to con four maggots in port, as he says it, by sending a stand-in in his place to collect gold for A Nice Flight. He bargained with one of Z.M.Q.'s men. That's all I know." Delta explained unsatisfactorily, stowing her earnings in the sash above her loincloth.

"We've already been conned. That wasn't very informative." The burly dealmaker griped. Ioz felt uncannily ripped off.

"Better than nothing." Delta scrupulously reminded.

"Down on her luck. I've heard better lies from a Biperian sales-snake. Once a singing-wench, always a singing-wench." Ioz digressed his annoyance from the tramp with a mumble.

"I heard that, pirate. Your captain reminds me of someone, back before Jargis's reign and before I lived on Pandaawa. I'd say he looks like King Primus but I've seen plenty of knock-offs from after Avadasia's reign in Octopon." Delta pranced along the bridge, talking light topics. Tula stirred her a somewhat restless face.

"That's because I'm his son, my name is Ren. That's Ioz." Ren listened over and included his own perspective.

"Really now? Hah, I used to know one of his attendants. Good old Vaecusa, heard she went off with him to fight one of the threats to Octopon at the time. Haven't seen her since, but aye she was an angry one. Nice only to me and a few of her other acquaintances. Well, I apologize to Ioz for not giving my regards sooner, but he doesn't seem to trust me very much." The watermorph humbled her presence, she was not blunt but patient and respectful. Vaecusa's mention was perceived soon after.

"Of course not, why, you'd have to be born of a people descended from greedy water-dragons to be able to run faster than a dagron." Jazhea shrunk to her shoulders in a bashful snicker. She wore a beauteous smile. "Dagrons aren't actually that fast, faster than monkeybirds." The venturing benefactor restlessly imparted eyes to Niddler in light of her phrase. "Dagrons are actually quite slow beasts, they only fly up to ten Gales." Her secret guise was covered when it scowled at the lack of interest in Ioz's comment. Contrite and scorned, a drop dribbled from her lid.

"You seem quite knowledgeable." Tula could not prevent herself from airing her perception, she laid her greens on the timid wreck. Jazhea abruptly hacked. "Are you okay?" Tula pried in response to the girl's peculiar cough.

"Of course. You know what, how about I teach you all some things?" Jazhea wittingly posed. "The dagrons are creatures with feelings of their own, they will judge you on first impression and decide if they care for you not. To ride a dagron, it's necessary to establish dominance, otherwise they won't listen. Bloth's dagrons are like this too, but from the sense I gather from them, they're used to being secondary so they will automatically do what they're told. Unless they detect weakness of course. Knowledge is the wind behind our sails, so who wants to have a new notch under their belt?" She petitioned the narrow crowd of onlookers as she patted Beesall's saddle. Ioz and Tula only granted her a eye of reluctance, but Ren stalwartly came forward.

"Good, Ren. Learning to ride a dagron will be a valuable skill if you're going to take on Bloth, and it's the least I can do to repay you. It's said they're hard to control but really, they just don't trust you yet. Don't be distracted by the smell, just concentrate. Good, just a little to the edge that way. She'll listen, just be sure of yourself." Overhead Jazhea confidently encouraged from the stern of the beast as Ren struggled to handle the bridle.

"I think she doesn't like me." Ren calmly expressed his frustration as he tugged for control of the reigns. Beesall cycled around the leading Wraith, not pleased with her obtrusive and bumbling assignment. The movements were choppy and wretchedly neurotic. The plaited instructor impatiently sighed.

"You might want to think about coming down here soon, Ren, the dark water is coming back and in full force!" Tula grit from operating the ground riggings.

"Ioz and Tula will get their turns too but you have to get this before they do. I won't be able to help you forever." The supervising lass forewarned. Jazhea maintained her rash hurrying and her reluctant student only faltered to achieve any good handle with the exception of when he carried downward. Ren doused with more unease, Beesall gnarled in response of her companion's timid control.

"Why not?" Ren forlornly questioned her within a misunderstanding glance. He imagined part of the reason he proceeded to fail was because of her anomalous mood that forged his worriment. Despite that, she had been a helpful teammate by far. She was on her own and so were the misfits of four, anything but a bonded effort did not make sense to him when they both wished the same for their home of Octopon.

"As I've said before, I eventually have to depart. I can't have you continuing to slow down for extra materials to keep me with you. My honor won't allow it." The fair lady twitched her eyes and worded her rationale.

"What are those?!" Ren jolted as Beesall suddenly curved around in an accelerating dip. "Ahhhhhhhh!" He screamed through the air, immediately loosing all sense from the beast. Jazhea pushed in the way.

"That's enough! No Beesall! Ugh..." Jazhea only menially succeeded in suppressing the mare, the scaly familiar flew with a craving velocity after many entities like spiders that were floating through the winding air-current. "Those are bameme, jelly-urchins of the sky, and Beesall loves to eat them. We will try to keep her away from them because they aren't healthy, but not even I can fully stop her from going after them. I fear they're her favorite food in the twenty seas." She huffed and stroked Beesall's hungry shoulder. The dagron proceeded to munch away without heed.

"Really." Ren blinked with a plain comment as he stretched his index-finger to touch upon one of the bizarre creations but wasn't able to finish.

"I'd recommend you not do that, those things can bite and it's quite painful." The braided escort immediately pruned Ren's mental-wheel in it's tracks. "As I was saying, they're her favorite food. She's gotten us into a number of traps because of them, so our return will have to wait until she's finished." Jazhea grumbled slightly at the well-expected behavior.

"Ioz isn't against you joining us anymore." Ren took a stab at what may be wrong, but Jazhea said nothing. Beesall snapped up the last remaining skimmer. "She's flying with me!" He spendidly whirled through the speeding gust, praising Beesall's liveliest speed. The span of her wings lifted her giant torso through mistral and fog. Just as Ren had mastered the mare to soar on roads of starlight her trainer seemed to have enough after another invite from the stressed pair. The new acquaintance landed and disembarked. "Jazhea, is there anything we can do for you?" Ren's concern didn't waver when he spoke to the woman. He tried to converse with her, but it was evident she was uneager to talk about something on her epic. He studied the map in question.

"The Treasure is there?" Jazhea poked, peculiarly pointing to the map.

"It's where the Compass is pointing." Ren stated with earnestness, his finger trailed along the islands scratched on the paper. The Compass glittered in the route of the isle, but it shifted diligently as the Wraith wildly cavorted through the infested waters. "Batten down the hatches! Jazhea, you can help Tula trim the sail!" He hastily instructed, flinging from his stance to seal some of the overlaying fixtures.

"Hurry up! We're in a real jam now!" Tula bellowed a call for action, retreating from slapping away resisting tendrils with her warrior's knife. The girls bounded into animation in a duo league.

"Well we are being slowed down." Ioz commented dispassionately. Jazhea experienced a twinge of guilt.

"Auughh! I hate being seasick on an empty-or a full stomach!" Niddler groaned, swaying to and fro before flopping down and sliding over the stretch of plank.

"Scot pango! This water is like a sea mules' death-maze." From wringing the helm Ioz exclaimed with gruff frustration. The vessel circuited the road out, away from the borders of Pandaawa and stayed proximate to the archipelago marked on the chart. The league had long since lost their enemies in the current, but it did not stop the sickly crud from aspiring to overtake them. The stuff flowed everywhere.

"Ever since we've been finding the Treasures, the dark water has been horrendous. At this time I can't tell whether we will we arrive at the Ruunta Cays." Ren undoubtedly mentioned. It was true, never had this sector of Pandaawa been so vile for movement.

"That would be my first guess and if you don't mind, I could use a hand!" Ioz abruptly hollered as he pivoted the wheel, passing patch after pool of dark water. The entire marine-scape shone a harlequin of black and blue.

"Right. Let's go help Ioz!" Ren responded to his shipmate's distress by leaning off the ledge with Niddler and temporarily dissolving a handful of plots of the pitiless ooze. The pair encircled the ship a couple times, hitting any sections missed. Tula toiled on adjusting the sails for the newly compiled path.

Jazhea beckoned with advancement to mount her pet, obstinate like steel on helping shuttle the bright man and the monkeybird near to the spots of the slime. Steadily, a trail in the waves developed. Ren carried himself back up by his legs with a little help from Niddler and their recent visitor. The Treasure flashed with a consistent brilliance as it faced a track of free water ahead. Jazhea heeded the gem with perplexity. "Why is it doing that?" She pondered in amazement of the curious magic.

"You don't know?" Ren questioned her inquiry, then he remembered she couldn't have been aware. "This is the 10th Treasure of Rule. It allows us to move things ecomantically, along with telling us where the water is free." He expressed easily to her. He rode sidesaddle on the reptile, beside his supposed-relation. The presumptive siblings were engrossed in an outward stare, surmising on what to do. Golden hair tousled over the wind. Jazhea continued to peruse the Treasure in wonder. The trio plunged to a landing on the board.

"We'll have to go in close for this one." Ren commanded swiftly, not a shy instant after plowing down on the flat. Bubbling off the port, Ren saw a new and more voluminous puddle of dark water. "Let's go Niddler!" He yelled to the monkeybird with anticipation. With a yawp the swoop of ruby feathers flocked for him and hovered with decline over the abysmal tide of black. Niddler tried to pass the Treasure to Ren and unfortunately a stygian tendril latched a squeeze on Ren's arm. "Chungo lungo!" He frenzied, Niddler let out a squawking gasp. He fought to rend his hand free as Niddler began to exert his wings to haul up, to no avail. Ren called out for Niddler to retrieve the Treasure with a pleading desperation, he strove to loose the Compass with the band about his neck. Niddler conducted to render the spiral crystal operable before another ebony appendage lashed around the opposite arm of the resisting prince.

"If I pull on this kreld-slop anymore, I'll lose my jitatan...feathers!" The monkeybird gathered limited bravery to dive for the scourge with the Treasure clutched in his feet.

"Brother, be careful!" Jazhea urgently screamed out to him from the Wraith, an upset flooded her words. She made an action to remount her dagron. She had started to swing her leg up upon the hide of the beast but before she could, an enormous splash reverberated out of the water. The dark water vanished and in place of it, surfaced a tremendous creature with eight legs.

"I am Octoquid of the Eleventh Temple of the Ruunta Kings!" The red-bearded squidman arose from legions of depth upon the squishy head of a colossal octopus of the reefs, his squelching challenge gurgled from the pads of his feelers to the eight-prongs of his trident. The pool of excellence beside the creature beget another being like a woman, which could vaguely be seen. It sustained all four limbs and the tail of a fish. One of the tentacles of the giant-octopus body had wrapped itself around a wooden projection on the Wraith and pushed it out to sea as Octoquid regressed with an ink of blue in a dive to return to his domain abound the waves. The fish-tailed woman snagged a clasp on Ren and in less than an instant, completely submerged him before he could even speak. The boyish regal threw out a hand in objection and that had been the last anyone saw of him. Niddler flurried above in panic and squawked out curses. He had been zipping past a mollusk tentacle, which tried to snag out for him.

"Ay jitata!" Jazhea swore, flustered after seeing the royal-relation taken. "We've got to get him back!" She shouted, imperative to the crewmates who daunted as she did. Whatever dragged him under was gone. The octopus persisted to grapple for the ship.

Tula leaned over the banister and having seen the whole thing, she focused her awareness. "As if you're the only one. We have to save him!" The brunet beauty cried out. She pressed her fingertips to her forehead, consolidating her stamina. Slowly she felt the duress of the creature begin to slide away. It released the appendage from the quarry, falling behind and fleeing back into the water. She needed to make the current move, just a little bit. She tapped into her energy, engaged to make the water part. Then a ludicrous sight and sound over the water interrupted her pursuit. Her tightly clenched eyes snapped open.

"Res Kaza vik Octopon er bunh guh." Sounded a voice that dangled omnipotent across the whooshing blue. Tula and Ioz jerked heads everywhere in wonder of the direction from whence it came. The ecomancer gazed over the water at the cerulean panes of a viridian-haired woman, her appearence not entirely human. "Nom dasvuze dask tok edac er syush yu ghush nom cha nom nif." The mirage of the entity's spacious face confessed from the water, a grandiose crown undeniably placed on her head. Beside the fantastic spectacle an enlarged icon like her tail of the fish was attached to the rest of her unseen abaft a far distance.

"Chungo lungo. What in the twenty seas." Tula's eyes grew like a leviathan, she whispered in awe. The sweeping projection started to fade out as apace as Ioz had seen it, and he even ditched the wheel to attain a glimpse. Another, more familiar picture, now lighted up in the waves. "Ren!" Tula cried out madly to him or at least, to what seemed to be him.

"Don't listen to her Tula! Something else is going on!" Ren's likeness abounded in a huge measure over the blanket of the water, but then dissolved as if he were being mystifyingly pushed out. The fish-finned biped took his place.

"Tok, wek tasa yu res Kaza vik Octopon dask tok ref plouben." The gorgeous depiction of the kidnapper declared with all seriousness, she was attractive enough despite being doubtlessly part swimmer.

"Who do you think you are? What have you done with Ren?" Tula demanded from the image as she disarrayed upon the deck of the becalmed transport, her umbrage and a slender rage of jealousy lucidly manifest.

"Ren er syush trew bunh jokta edac er syush trew nom. Wek tasa. Faffsootad." The aquamarine meddler flickered over the seascape again to address the pink-clad ecomancer one final time, a tinge of superiority conveyed with her as she faded out.

"Ay Chunga lunga! Speak Merrian Common, why don't you!" Tula expressed frustration, her teeth fiercely bared. She felt ready to fly into a storm, thrashing her curved warrior's knife against the edge of the impediment in agitation. She scornfully hissed. She wanted to use her powers to do something about the situation but she didn't know where to center her energy. Only a flash occurred and Ren had gone away...somewhere.

"You, slum-maiden! If you want to see land or life again then help us out and go in after our captain." Ioz spun about, desperately demanding the water-breed's aid.

"Sorry. You know why they call me Delta?" Delta frankly apologized.

"Here it comes. Why?" Ioz sullenly baffled on her reasoning.

"A delta is as far as I can swim, and any saltwater will burn my skin. Then, I will die." Delta regretfully informed the awaiting company.

"Peachy. Just peachy." Ioz grunted after an aggravated forehead slap. The quietude prolonged, Delta crossed her legs and leaned against the railing.

"But, I can tell you what she said." Delta smugly communed with reassurance.

"We don't have any more gold to spare, woman." Ioz glowered after an enraged insult.

"Bai-Newts are sisters of the Saetail. Though our languages are different, we can understand some similar dialect...The Prince of Octopon is mine now. Your journey will no longer be necessary but thank you for your help. No, I'm sorry but the Prince of Octopon will not be returning. Ren is needed with me more than he is needed with you. I'm sorry. Goodbye. That's what I heard." Delta acclaimed her approximate interpretation of the unfortunate news. Tula sizzled with more anger than before.

"Well, we know he's safe." Ioz casually stated, crossing his arms as he poised next to the raven-haired magic-doer and perhaps still sore from earlier. Tula pointed him a glare, which he picked up on. "What? Maybe there's a Treasure of Rule down there." He argued with some quip in his pitch, his eyes bounced to settle on his female crewmate. Tula noticed he stared at the exotic kidnapper with a different kind of curiosity.

"So now can I have your water-tub?" Delta blurt in, seeking earned rights.

"Go ahead. We can't use it now, anyway." Ioz bitingly huffed, granting reluctant permission.

"We have to go after him, you...straggly-brained sea-pig! Don't you remember when you were in the same position?" The ecomancer quivered to shout her ire and agitation bluntly into words. Ioz wasn't responsible but he was making her temper worse, and Ren could not intercede.

"Hey! Don't blame me! What do you want me to do about it, woman? He's obviously somewhere we can't swim to!" The pirate quarreled back to reason with the sorceress who distinctly displayed a shorter fuse than usual, he undoubtedly had been at a loss for the next action as well. He let his retaliation taper off. "Even if we do, we don't know where he is." He staidly reminded as to figure a way out of the dilemma.

"There aren't any amphecytes around here." Tula informed with a brumal drawl. This section did not include much of anything. She bore green flecks into the mincing ocean, her discernment told her the air-puffed creations would not inhabit this depreciated area. The horizon yonder brought waters sprinkled with black. Her stressed tone drifted downward, stretching out for a plan.

"We passed a place where some may be but it's far away from here if I can remember right." Jazhea offered insight to the debate. "I could fly there on Beesall but someone would have to stay here." She specified, volunteering to assist. "Then...even if we did, we couldn't just look for him indefinitely. I'm afraid that is something only a King's army could do." She backtracked, her ambition derailed and her locomotion stymied. Tula visibly exuded more frustration than ever.

"Jazhea, why do you wish you could be a King?" With a moment of perplexity, Tula candidly insinuated am unlikely idea. Jazhea was silent.

"Hold on, Tula." Niddler cawed readily, an idea activated him. He picked himself up into the sky, beholding his surroundings and then darting back to drop down on plank. "I know where we are, I think I know how we can help Ren." He circumspectly pitched the idea with a squawk.

Tula reacted with doubt but she discerned something of a good plan from the monkeybird. "What is it, Niddler?" She asked him, her voice dabbled with irritation but she had cooled her heels.

"There's an island here where there's a witch who can give you a potion to turn you into a Saetail! Then you can breathe underwater." The monkeybird timidly revealed. Ioz and Tula exchanged a glance.

"Sounds like a pirate's tale to me, monkeybird." Ioz indifferently rebuffed, palpably unconvinced.

"How do you know about this, Niddler?" Tula challenged skeptically, wanting to be sure of his conviction. It did not sound very likely.

"Once when Bloth needed it, he sent me here to get it for him." Niddler rapidly strained out, the edge in his words avoiding something.

"What would Bloth want with a potion that turns you into a saetail?" Tula peeked below at the monkeybird and could have asked him to repeat, slightly bewildered as her inflection of disbelief rose. Niddler delivered her a stare that said he did not really wish to answer, and the ecomancer felt compelled to believe him. "Show us where it is." Tiredly, she gave in. She wearily sighed.

The fathomless blue puckered, cold and dense as it parted the way. The hand pulled Ren increasingly faster and inmost through the water, attached to the four-limbed woman with a tail of scaly brine. He wondered how much longer she would drag him down. He tried holding his breath, but it became progressively strenuous with the inclination to draw in absent air. Her grasp locked sturdily on his wrist when he fought her previously. There was something unusual about her. He saw a dollop of dark water quickly bearing down. His eyes expanded as he tried to rouse her in alarm, but to his wondrous astoundment, it split for her. The Compass of Rule pointed a beam at the frontside of her stomach, she must have been a Treasure of Rule. He was disabled in any speculation by his lungs bawling for air. Noy jitat.

Ren emerged above water. He briskly gulped the wind before he could discover his environment. It resembled a kind of underwater cave. His head protruded over the waterline, which enabled him to breathe. The damsel had arose partially out of the pool to speak with him. "Greetings, Prince of Octopon, my name is Adea. I am the princess of the underwater nation of the islands of Ruunta. I have brought you here because you need to abandon your Quest and stay here for life. You need to further advance and protect our people from the dark water." She instructed him as he gawked at her in a state of perfect ambiguity.

Ren drifted in a pause before he started to formulate. "Where are your people, Adea? I can help you, but my Quest is of the most crucial importance. I'm sorry." Ren boldly recited as he stood up in the knee-high water, not quite sure how to appeal this but his emotions surged. "No, I can't stay here. I have to find the Treasures of Rule to save Mer from the dark water. For Mer and everyone." He argued his prerogative to the eccentric lady who had abducted him. He did not know what her purposes were, but he did not intend to remain here like she wanted.

"I'm sorry Prince of Octopon, but you must stay forever. If you don't, our people and our world will be destroyed. All your needs will be provided. I know I've made the right choice when I've decided that you will be the one to rule with me. I've waited for this opportunity for so long. I've been watching you for a long time, Ren." Adea started in response. She now sloped close to him, a little too close for comfort. Ren backed away from her with narrowed eyes.

"No! You can't keep me here! I have to go back to finding the Treasures of Rule and I have to get back to my friends!" Ren's rightly choice resonated before her, not wanting to be in such an arrangement at all. Nevermind she had not really explained herself to him. Yet, the Compass still signaled directly to her belly.

"There is no way back through the water without my guidance, even if you could breathe you will not make it through the dark water. You also will not leave here, even if you could. It's true, Ren. You may have already guessed, I have your next Treasure of Rule." Adea crooned to him, laying it certainly on the line. He knew her words were right.

Ren fuddled, at a complete loss. If she harbored the Treasure within herself, he could not exactly make her give it to him. "What purpose do I serve you?" Ren sought of her, slowly. He sighed in temporal defeat.

"There is a Treasure of Rule within you. With this power, we can keep our people safe. Forever." The fin-tailed captor illustrated.

"How do you know that?" The dumbfounded prince stumbled out. "I can't do such a thing! Please, if you give me the Treasure, then I'll be able to cure our entire planet, not only here!" Ren urgently protested, asserting the importance in his will.

"There are still things you don't understand, Prince of Octopon." She leaned closer to him as he tried to tilt away. He worrisomely heeded back at her with a stubborn gaze.

The Wraith sloshed way through the midst of the sea and en route of a tiny atoll, almost just commodious enough to hold Zoolie's gaming house.

"We'll be there in two licks of a sea-leopard. Let's catch that leeward wind. Hey-!" Ioz fortified the steering wheel through crashing waves, yearning for the sight of land soon on the horizon. His feet shuddered.

"Don't look at me like that. I can remember names, you know. So Ioz, you're one of those reliable port-dogs, are you? Not easy to be bought off? How about I sing you a lullaby for free? I could really use someone to keep me safe. Sea-men are always praising my perfect notes." Delta's luxurious pitch became ever velvety when she unconditionally stroked the tip of her paw over the rugged breast. Ioz instantly knee-jerked.

"Nice try, wench, but this pirate isn't swayed by schemers with round hips." The veteran sailor instantly retreated, feeling an adverse compulsion. "Besides, I'm...married." He flit his eyes to and fro, skipping the matter completely.

"Delta, we'd like to dock sometime this moon-harvest." Tula spiked her enlightenment. Her coolness was irked in the midst of tying down a line.

"Is that so? Well that has never stopped anyone before...but then who, might I ask, would you say you're married to?" Delta winked under the triangle of her heart-shaped eye-patch, pulling closer with a hint of distrust.

"I'm married to uhh...Tula." Ioz slung his eyes to his rosy travelmate, entirely making up his excuse.

"Oh yes, we have whole nights of fun together. Like when we share the friendly responsibility of scrubbing out the galley canteen when Ioz isn't blowing all our gold at Zoolie's Gamehouse." Tula offered as she strut by with a barnacle-crusted barrel formerly filled with stock, placing it on the sidelines for later use. Ioz nodded. Tula hid her uncanny guise.

"I think I can change that." Delta smiled cleverly when she crept out of her space barrier. Ioz backed up, easily having sour memories evoked.

"Like Ioz would be happy with anyone, he'll get spliced to a chest-of-pearl before he'd take to any actual woman." Tula burbled in the backwind of Delta's flattery and ruffled on Ioz as his eyelids slunk. The egotistical swashbuckler sputtered, but he couldn't admit to himself how those words actually hurt.

"He'll be happy with me." Delta vicariously fleered, she whisked a darting loop of her feeler around Ioz's copper breast.

"So I heard Mantus cheated you." Ioz flatly remarked, granting the preying insulter a strong-enough push-back with his palms.

"Aye. You'd be right. Stingy barnacle didn't pay me. After I sung him a beautiful song, too." Delta ceased her sleazy hunt upon a smooth expression of synchrony with her audience. She crossed her arms to present an nonthreatening advance to her chosen desire.

"Sea-weasel duping another sea-weasel, how appropriate. Was a plump...table-legged brute with him?" Ioz suspected after a remembrance traced his mind.

"Maybe." Delta casually considered with a roll of her unguarded eye. She drew in closer. "By the way, I know one more small thing of interest. Don't think I don't have my reasons for doing this, but I like you for your pirate's spirit, so I'll let you in on a little secret. I know that Bloth is having trouble with his men mutinying because it's Z.M.Q he has to pay off, and the wild-card in this, the Polar Prince, is trying to silence Z.M.Q. Now you know your fluid-like-water blade, Liege Mizzen-Conquest, he's in this ploy too. Forty of everything Bloth keeps, he uses to wager on shady deals in port." Delta submit her lore.

"Bloth and Mantus are sixty-forty, now what does this have to do with us? Clarify on this Polar Prince business." Ioz listened, assessing this new prospect.

"That many men who have seen the pirate Z.M.Q have seen the Polar Prince, which is none. Now, a friend of my partner was lost in a Coral Reef between Bentar and Aymara then shipped out to one of those ghost-nations by Mizzen-Conquest, under Bloth's instruction. Apparently, for Z.M.Q.'s usage as one of his water-dogs. Word on Pandaawa says, it might have been Sugii's wizard which means Z.M.Q. was willing to pay Mizzen-Con with something you're looking for. Avenge my ship-man's manfriend, and I may just pay you back some day." Delta whispered her mysterious whim. The feelers like anemone comprising Delta's pink hair twirled around the buccaneer's bronze chest, her vogue form tapped away after seductively running a pad over the strands of the facing front-knot.

"Thanks, Delta." Ioz tipped his hair from her duress as he was not wholly sure whether to be grateful or offended and grossed-out, his fears divided after only having learned another lost their soul in the same reef he almost lost his life in twice. Delta returned to her pool after confidently stepping away.

"You really weren't kidding about the size of this island, Niddler." Tula mentioned smartly to the colorful avian-friend next to her as she poked into a spyglass at the island encroaching on her.

"Well this is the place." The monkeybird shyly squawked.

"Let's just hope they have what we're looking for." Ioz sharply rolled out as he spun the wheel. Doubt had unquestionably crept into his mind. "Jazhea and Delta, let's trim those sails and make sure we're not bilge-bait when we drop anchor." He instructed as he handled the insidious route.

"Dark water should be clear!" Jazhea called as she leaned off her flying beast to vanish a blob of black ooze from the moving ship.

"Great." Ioz replied with a jaded air. The Wraith sailed to the shoreline of the measly plot.

"There's one other thing..." Niddler pad to them in anticipation of going on further.

"What is it, monkeybird?" Ioz spun his head to examine, making Niddler wary.

"Only one person can go up at a time." The leery monkeybird disclosed with a gulp, avian eyes peeked at the stone structure ahead.

"Then it will be me." Tula briskly volunteered, surety in her purpose. She flipped off the deck from a rope, embarking on the small sandbar. It was noticeably barren except for the craggy hut. She saw that there appeared to be a door to the building, so she pressed to enter and it swung open with relative ease. "Hello? Is anybody home?" She rung with a scouting perspective, shouting into the rangy edifice of rock.

"Anybody? Do you mean, Anything, dear?" The feminine but shrill voice of the proprietor investigated her. Tula whirled around with worry but she then fixed her eyes on a being like a cat strolling to greet her. "What may I help you with, my dear?" The feline mutation whom appeared to be female interrogated her. The tone sounded much like an old witch may note.

"I need a potion, to allow me to breathe underwater." Tula pursued with conviction, eying the stranger whom made her more than a bit skittish.

The female feral-creature produced a noise tuning with the sweetness of a purr and a growl. "May I ask why?" The cat-morph inspected her, like it were imperative to know.

Tula tangled with her words for a delay, then she decided it would be best to tell the truth. "My friend was kidnapped by a saetail." With all truthfulness, the shade-trimmed enchantress told guardedly.

The feline was silent and then it let out a very peculiarly composed cackle. "This is a very common problem. Come with me." The feline-being beckoned her to the innermost lodging of the dwelling. Tula reluctantly followed, blade at the ready. She shifted her eyes promptly back and forth between unlit and solid-stone walls.

The deepsea-bound grotto was mostly opaque on the inside with the exception of the radiant water. Only through a tiny vent in the top of the dome did the indigo light from the night sky of the frontier beacon through. The lake remained silent but ablaze with the sounds of dialogue from a sand-haired nobility and an aquatic empress, who was emanating a white-blue glow.

"I can't!" The descendant with sallow hair chanted in surprise as he backed away from the offending target that was consistently drawing in taut on him. He tumbled on the rockface he had been resting on, still knee-deep in the surrounding pool of cobalt water. Ioz and Tula would of course, never know this fun they were missing out on.

"But Ren, you must stay here. If you don't..." The female creeping for the adolescent besought on. She didn't continue her thought.

"Please tell me why." The prompt gentleman entreated precisely and diplomatically of her. He strove to be as sympathetic as he could without knowing any kind of story about her but he found his chest affronted with a stony plate-regalia and a rainbow cape that guarded him against any escape.

"All will be revealed when the two moons set this morning." Adea firmly attested. It did not seem like she would tell him anything else, but she asserted to divulge once more. "I will let you talk to your friends again. You may tell them where you are, as long as you understand that you must stay." She presented the offer of the unfair compromise. Ren searched his glint to the opening in the formidable dome above, which showed him that morning had not yet become alive in the sky.

Ren sighed. He hoped to Kuunda he would find out something soon. He did not want to do this, but he might be forced to agree this deal. "I have to collect the Treasure of Rule, I can't stay here. Please try to understand." Disappointingly, the regal again aspired to reason with her. Her resolve could have been weakening because instead of insisting, she dragged him off into the creek underneath the subterranean. She secured him by his hand and placed it on the bridge of her nose, he gathered his spirit's application.

The curiously built stone-house lit up dimly as the petite orbs on shelves were discharging, reflecting fulgor from outside. The black-haired lass inside the room affixed in study of a vial containing a green and teal liquid. "That was quick." Tula remarked with relative amazement. She topped the vial with it's cork and folded it into her waist sash.

Cat obscurely giggled and began to warble. "It only works once. If you want to change back, you completely leave the water. Good luck to you, dear." The feline hissed, bidding her visitor farewell. She closed the door to her bouldered hutch. With a run and climb, Tula roved back on top the floorboards of the waiting ship.

"How did it go?" Ioz, the dusky-maned navigator, welcomed her return. He noticed her pull out the vial after she clambered aboard deck.

"I've got it, I'm going after him now." Tula managed to foretell with an uncertain inflection. She eyed the glass, about to jump into the water when she noticed a reflection materialize. Her foot stopped from the apex of the railing. "Ren?" She questioned at first. Her eyes grew enormous when she observed her friend's face magnified over the sea. "Ren!" She shouted her greeting, now realizing his presence prevailed.

"Tula!" The face in the ocean called to her. "I'm in a cave somewhere, some distance away from where we were. I don't know where I am. The Treasure of Rule is down here." The portrait of the regent illustrated to her from the surface of the sea, he ceased before he amplified again. "I'm going to try to get it, keep the dark water away from the Wraith. If anything happens, go on without me. I can't talk lon-" Ren halted for something, cut off amidst. His jammed illusion dwindled out once more.

Tula's mouth fashioned the mold of one stunned and confounded. She shrunk down for a moment, and then skipped up on the railing of the hull. "I'm going after him!" With a bitter ambition in her timbre she announced.

"See! I told you the Treasure of Rule was down there!" Ioz instantly added to her purport, throwing his arms out in front of him with an arrogant gesture at her. Tula tossed him a forestalling glare. Niddler anxiously fluttered toward the side of the barrier she perched on.

Tula popped open the vial and guzzled it in one swig. She couldn't believe her eyes when she started to transform into a hybrid mermaid. Behind her, an aquamarine tail stemmed from her backside. She had lost her balance and plummeted off the Wraith. "Watch the ship!" The last thing cried out before she dove under the tide was directed at the two humans and a red mixture of fur and feathers above. Silence carried throughout.

"Half-masted woman, told her there was a Treasure of Rule down there." The swaggering pirate continued to mutter outloud to his lonesome. "What?" He noticed Niddler and the girls were gawking, so he discontinued his ramblings.

The unfathomable azure seas dabbled with black abyss as two figures hailed, one of which troubled to clamp his mouth shut. He pointed, beckoning some stretch away from himself and the chartreuse-haired temptress next to him. He clasped his palm to seal his mouth.

Ren needed to breathe and the eccentric hybrid who possessed him only now rushed for a cove within distance. Then he saw something out of the creak of his eye. The capricious and toned form sculled, actively approaching. The entity flared of charcoal tresses and vibrant eyes like emeralds. "Tula!" He would have relieved, had he been able to unlatch his lips. Adea unquestionably noticed and clenched his wrist, whirling him swiftly away. Tula had been breaking-even with the oceanic girl's swim. Then Ren distinguished something different about her, she was a saetail too! He envisioned a breathless gasp, being towed rapidly off to the enclosure from where he came. Adea had lost her with an unmatchable speed. He saw Tula in the distance laboring to perform something, the water between himself and the roseate enchantress foamed with a likeness of a tiny sea-twister and then she vanished from his field of view. He returned to the softly gleaming den with Adea's oversight, his lungs filled with salty sea-air once again.

In the morning skies over gently quaking waves, the barrier of sea and air broke by a pink eco-sorceress arising from the deep.

"Scot pango!" The ecomancer's curse flooded in the wind. Above her floated a ship where a man and another woman who was beside a monkeybird all scouted her curiously. The sounds of chatter greeted her as she ferociously tried to still her focus. "Ioz, come on!" She bordered on screaming and launched what she maintained in her hand at the crewmate on deck.

The rugged sailor on the nautical craft regarded her with befuddlement. "Ay chungo chipungo! What's wrong now, woman?" Ioz bludgeoned out when he caught the amphecyte in his palm, observing the partially-seaworthy associate below with bafflement.

Tula let out an exhausted sigh. "She's too fast, Ioz. I can't keep up with her speed. Now get down here!" Tula demanded tediously to the teammate planted on the board. She dove underneath the waves once more.

"Can't handle things by yourself, eh, Tula?" Ioz dryly chaffed his lips. He mounted the railing with a leg-up and arranged to hurdle off. He slacked before he put the amphecyte on his head to address the primate bird. "Watch the ship, Niddler, make sure she's hove to and don't let the dark water come near or you won't be a happy monkeybird when I come back!" He threatened with no delay, placing the air-filled creature over his tip-top. He vaulted headfirst in a plunge, following the ecomancer. Niddler secured the Treasure in his paws, grimly watching Ioz's splash in the aqua dissipate. After the helmsman disappeared, the monkeybird turned to pad around. Jazhea beckoned to him.

"By the twin moons, I think I see dark water in the distance, quick, give me the Treasure!" Jazhea forcefully impelled the monkeybird before her in all criticality, she pointed in the direction away from them. Niddler protestingly allowed it to her, gaping at her with frightened globules of green. "You're coming with me, girl. You have to take over for me if my sight goes out." She unhesitatingly captured Delta and pulled her away with her. The rainbow-winged bird watched her sprint for her dagron and glissade to the air, swiftly in the decided direction. "I'll be back!" She hollered down to him from the clouds. It had not been until her receding blotch faded like haze in the horizon when the idea at last found Niddler.

"Why would she need someone to take over for her eyes when we're here? That's strange...I don't see any dark water out there." Niddler floated a length above the plateau of the Wraith as he scanned the wavering blue, his purview reached far out of the range Jazhea warned of. For once, he perused nothing but pristine-clean water.

Water below sea-level greatly contrasted with murky and glossy swirls. Two figures stirred the way forward, carefully spinning around areas patched with black. They were fast advancing on a deep-set cove up ahead.

Through the ocean deep, Tula latched to Ioz by the arm as she plunged at accelerated speed toward the cave she had seen Ren carted to. "This way!" Tula glugged out. The water filling her mouth did not seem to bother her, she could pronounce words as fluently in water as on land. Ioz could not reply and simply acknowledged with his head.

Inside a cavern, dim moonlight of dawn peeked through a cranny at the summit of a high ceiling. It shone over the stillness of crystal below, illuminating in a grand silver. Farther down, an aquatic essence squirmed as if something began to change her. The resembling mineral of a dazzling spectrum had fallen from her belly.

Ren admired the above, the two full moons became the prominent items over the snug window of blue. He inspired his gait to the woman cautiously, seeing the dropped token. It appeared be an oversized scale. He picked it up and cradled it in his palm, she did not seem to be hurt. He didn't want to leave now. "The Treasure?" The prince tranquilly invited her. The arcane woman only nodded her head, her expression hard to read. It was then he realized something was wrong. "Can you speak?" He cautiously inquired. She shook her head no. "Adea..." He uttered softly, he felt badly for her. He began to push the Treasure toward her but instead of taking it, she backed away and beckoned with her finger as if she wished him to follow. Slowly, he stood up from where he had been sitting upon the shelf and trekked for her through the basin of knee depth. She submerged into a cavity of deeper water and disappeared. She then remounted with delicate hands containing a frame made of shell. She handed it to Ren.

Ren appraised the husk. Inside, he studied a picture with people. He glued eyes on a fair-haired dignitary standing by a sunny-toned woman of garnet tresses and olive eyes. "Mother and Father..." Ren mused as he intensely stared at the photograph. The woman, his mother, held a baby that he presumed to be himself. Ren focused his eyes on a strange woman next to his parents, another woman with her, who looked like a younger Jenna...and a man he recognized. "Teron?!" He unexpectedly blurted. What was the healing ecomancer doing in the panorama? Below the four standing adults were young boys. Only one of them was shown with his father's platinum hair, the other two bore a rust color like his mother's. Standing right under his mother and the unfamiliar woman was a child with blond pigtails, a girl about three or four years old. "Jazhea." He whispered a sure guess. He pored over the picture for a long spell, as if trying to piece things together in his interpretation. He troubled with inhaling or even blinking, he fixated so strongly on the photo he cinched in his hands. His fortitude broke when to his argument, the resident beside him seized the case away. Then she pointed at a specific part of the picture, the baby Ren in the photo.

"Me?" Ren suggested, not gathering what she was trying to say. She motioned a nod, then she signaled to herself. She then pointed to several marks on the depiction of the Royal family of those wearing crowns. Ren solidly granted her a puzzled face. She gestured between herself and then to him again, to the tops of the heads in the photo. She drew near to him as if about to kiss his lips. She captured his hand and led him somewhere else within the cavern where there rested a reflective surface ahead, it seemed to be a large mirror. Adea beckoned for Ren to come close, so he waded over to her through the stream. She returned the heirloom picture to Ren and he quickly pocketed it in his tunic to peruse later. Ren spied into the mirror and saw to his surprise, the reflection showed a projection of he and Adea as King and Queen of Octopon. Ren wore an exquisite crown atop his head. "What? What is this?" He queried with a stunned reverence. Was he dreaming? He backed away from the glass. He heard a commotion echoing in the cave and he stumbled around to scout for it's origin. He whipped his head about, and he saw visitors.

"Ren! You're not hurt!" The regal pioneer sheered from his fascinating audience as he distinguished the two figures slushing forward, one frantically calling for him. The audacious woman he identified as Tula swam toward him, although now her shape arose differently for him as she was projecting a colorful fish tail from her backside. Beside her, he sighted a staunch fellow in the midst of struggling to free a leeching creature from the cranium. Ioz conquered the amphecyte with a growl, which sounded much like he was suffering quite a bad headache. He probably did not want to talk to anyone until it went away.

"Ay chungo lungo!" The faithful buccaneer cursed in a weary reunion. "Well here's our prince, getting himself into more mischief." He paused, subduing the swollen mouth of the air-brain. "Ready to go, Ren? Or would you like a cave to yourselves, ah?" He spurred the questing partner, his black eyes then focused on the shining scale the youthful leader cherished sheepishly in his hands. "See there, woman! I told you there was a Treasure of Rule down here!" Ioz boasted his accuracy, goading at the gleaming object as he poised straight in the water. He only schlepped a short length above his ankles.

Tula sighed, ignoring the pirate's quip. She flopped over to the succubus who stood in front of Ren. "It's good we found you Ren, before this sea-leech did you any more harm." She talked to the athletic lad but not without motioning to the saetail nearby, who she viewed as untrustworthy. Her eyes twitched to Adea and greeted her with an envious leer.

"Actually, Tula, I'm not done here yet." Ren casually turned to his questmate and declared with a calm dignity.

"Ren, do you know how we busted our tails trying to find you and you want to stay?" Perhaps due to the result of Ren being down here with the unknown woman and the conclusion he needed to be found, Tula had started to contest the jocund man's decision before he could state otherwise.

"Looks like Ren's found a new Quest." Ioz decisively bantered, sitting on the rockface a minimal section behind Ren and resting his head in his hands in waiting. Tula sulked and reposed, showing obvious exasperation.

"I'll be ready soon, I promise." Ren verbalized to reassure them. He yielded to the sea-grassy woman and before she could react, pressed the scale into where it previously had been. She then confessed.

"My people were once a prosperous race before the Year of the Black Tide." Adea began to modestly detail. "It was the dark water that deformed us and led us down here. The effects of the purple mist were very strange. Everyone is gone and I was the last of our race now, I had given up hope...however, I needed to at least try." She paused and encumbered to finalize her words. "It is now that I realize you are truly the Shining One, so I will set you free. I've given you my insight and the gift. First, you need to look into the Mirror of Untruth once more. As I explain..." Adea roped the Treasure to her stomach as she dragged Ren to set his peek another time into the shining threshold.

Ren's eyes flashed open when the mirror placed back to him a vivid imagery of he and Niddler flying to the lighthouse. Ioz and Tula were on the ground. Ioz wielding a manificent dragonbow, Tula her nature spells. The dark water was dying and fading to demise. "What does this mean? Our Quest is in vain?" Ren seemed unsettled by the vision. The effigy swelled and then transformed into a speckled daub of white before it faded out.

"No." Adea shook her head in disarray. "It only means your actions will not transpire as you expect them to." She blinked rainbow-lidded eyes, focusing on Ren upon laying florid fingertips atop his shoulders. "The Sons of Octopon were kidnapped by the Southern pirating nation of Valjen. Enemies of the throne, they spared no quarter to the palace they were abducted from. This may be how some from Octopon were lost. Seventeen years is only a rip-current for the Ruunta Saetail. Your frame, if you look on the back..." She signaled for her company to lift the image.

"My dearest son, Ren. Should the sea have taken me and if the Second Element is in play, allied with those who seek the Treasures for personal gain and selfish ruin, seek Mizar. Phorlock. Iskjar. Teron. Kauldron. Apsin. Sheelia and Sugii. Your suitor, Adea, has cared for this relic as one of the final defenses against the dark water. Mer should be lost if the secret of the Treasures of Rule are known to these evil forces. The Key of the Treasures is needed to activate the Healing Light, and it is only found with the Good of Merr's leadership." Ren nestled the momento in within his palm and begin to read. He shifted his gaze on Adea. "What about Bloth's role in this?" Ren interrogated further.

"I'm afraid I do not know." Adea sorrowfully told to the brink of her knowledge on Octopon's history. "Unfortunately without the Treasure of Rule I cannot speak anymore to any I may have, at least until the dark water is vanished for good. You must go now, the Treasure of Patience is now yours. I will use a spell within myself to grant a last request. It will allow you safety but it will seal me into the Mirror of Untruth forever, or until the day I am released again to a better Mer." Concluding her chosen tale to him, she ripped the scale from her stomach and charged it back to Ren. She forced it into his hands and swam away faster than he could stop her.

"Hey wait! How terrible..." Ren screamed out after her. He clipped the Treasure with him, but she had already zoomed away. Gone. He never did learn about the workings of the mirror.

"Now we're ready to go, buddy." Ioz led accordingly and came by his side. He tossed Ren an amphecyte, which had been caught in the water while he adjusted on putting his own back on.

Tula peered at him with curiosity. "What did she mean by the gift?" The slightly-leery ecomancer wondered of him.

"She meant this." Ren gingerly confided to her as he hesitated, but he produced the picture he had tucked away. "It's my family." He delicately unveiled. Tula's eyes broadened with incredulity.

"Teron?" She verified the familiar man in the keepsake as the younger version of the chief ecomancer. "What is he...doing there?" Tula questioned with awe.

"I don't know. This is a picture from my Father that he took on his Quest." Ren replied, he bore terrifically at the image one last time before tucking it away. "We have to help Adea now, after we return this Treasure to the lighthouse we'll find some way to help her, the Imbibers with the Orphans and everyone else. Let's go back." He bid his last words within the water hutch before equipping the natural breathing-gear. The trio swam through the exit of the passageway to the domain.

The sun shone of a bright arrival as the three adventurers at last emerged from the depths below. Amazingly, the Wraith couldn't be found where it was previously set, but located instead on shores of a nearby island. Niddler later confessed to moving it.

Tula glided to land before the men and upon leaving the water, resumed her ordinary design. To the wonder of every crewhand, some of Adea's sea washed up and filled barrels with drinking water. She climbed aboard the Wraith and with dread, found Niddler to be the only passenger with the orphans. He espied her embark with a fearful woe.

"Niddler..." Tula's worrisome intonation rose as she scoured around with sharp eyes, searching for any sign of the blond or her beast. "Where's Jazhea?" She inquired him with a real disturbance growing on her face.

"About that..." Niddler started to meager out, knowing of the impending trouble he would soon be wing-deep in. "She said she was going to clear away dark water she saw in the distance, but she hasn't returned since." The timorous monkeybird dolefully updated. He let out a mournful squawk.

Ren and Ioz now scaled the board just as Niddler had started to explain. "What?!" Stammered a spurned pirate, who finished hoping over the rail and brandished a sword out of habit. He too rummaged about industriously for any sign of the woman. "Where did she go? She better not have the Treasure, monkeybird!" Ioz bellowed in a threatening tone at Niddler as he advanced toward the avian. Niddler gandered sad eyes at him and gulped. This answered his question. "That despicable shardfish of a woman!" He crossly rumbled and thrashed his brand against the protective rail of the helm. "I knew we never should have trusted her, I said she was a bilge-snake of Janda-town trouble! Noy jitata!" He growled in rage so much that he couldn't think. "This is all your fault, monkeybird!" He prodded his nervy blade at Niddler with blame.

"Hey, you're the one who jumped ship, you kreld-scooping darva-larva! I was here all alon-" Niddler flurried his wings and cussed with an unfinished shriek.

"What?" Ren echoed with surprise as he scud around the ship, frisking through the cabin, anywhere, for the missing woman. "I don't believe it! She really is my sister! How could she..." The prince faltered, stunned. Dumbfounded. He tried to justify any other reason in his mind this could have happened.

"Well you better believe it, Ren! That sister of yours is a swindling sea-rat and a traitor!" The veteran seafarer roared back, hissing fury puffed through his freezing demeanor. Ren's aghast intensity stilled.

"No...I won't believe it, there must have been a reason she didn't say." Ren studied the keepsake he nestled with the smaller form of his sister etched within. He blinked with wide eyes, not wanting to think about her reason. He fronted the wheel with strength behind his movements. "We're going to find her." He announced with vigor. "We'll find the Treasure and we'll find out what happened." Ren darkly looked down and then ahead. Courage trimmed his solid and unflinching voice as he avowed his commitment. "With the 11th Treasure of Rule we'll sail the whole twenty seas if we have to find her again." He swallowed any fear or doubt in his mind. He would find her. He opened his closed eyes and steered onward into sectors remote.

Far away, North of a region called Pandaawa, the sea tumbled diligently as the grandiose megalith pummeled way through the gnashing tide. Aboard the deck, a door to a foggy lodge creaked open. The profile transfixed inside sat at a table. He did not successfully turn to glimpse at the stranger before the bright object clanked against the wooden surface of the workspace.

Vision focused on the item that had hit the table. He picked it up and stroked the smooth mineral arranged in a spiral formation, which resonated like glass or crystal. "This is it, is it?" The profound voice of the man quaked heavily yet sweetly through the chamber.

"You didn't think I would disappoint, did you?" The sugary inquest from a cunning churl echoed from the doorway. The sound of her footsteps were faintly heard as she strode closer.

"You've done well. From even a Z.M.Q. dog, more than I could have imagined." The overseer laughed, pleased as he saw her form come near. She sported a clever smile pasted on her lips. He wore a wicked face of elation as he rested a pallor arm around her shoulder.

"All in a day's work, Bloth." The woman proclaimed, sneaky eyes of peacock were just visible in the moonglow. "After all. You Are going to make me the Queen of Octopon." Jazhea capably smirked with a sweet shape of her smug face at the behemoth next to her. He grinned at her as if he already succored the city for trade.


	10. Betting for Nerves of Steel

Chapter 9

Embarkment

Part ? Betting for Nerves of Steel

Off to sea in some small corner of Mer, North of the dominion where monkeybirds make their homes, a ship under the warm sky steadily traversed the borders of the area. Within the vicinity, no silence prolonged. Voices interrupted. Screeching of a woman's sharp utterance ricocheted over the deck of the Maelstrom.

"Get lost, wench! I don't care who ya are! If I were allowed, I'd rip you apart like a rotten nest of darva-worms! Ye look like nothing and ye are nothing!" The resentment of a gruff yet muscular-featured pirate bellowed out of a toothless mouth. The offending sand-hair opposite him simply tormented him more by laughing obnoxiously. He possessed a wooden mop in his hands for swabbing the floor and he nearly broke it in twain over his knee in rage.

"Says you!" Jazhea flaunted, she continued to hector in a way both snobbish and ornery. Her heckles made the men on deck desire to do something about her as the egging-on prevailed. "I'm going to become Queen of Octopon and when I do you will all bow to me!" She persisted in throwing tantalizing jeers at a few of the angry rapscallions who were on cleaning duty in the area. They all expressed the intense hankering to nail her to the boards of the deck.

"Wear your Z.M.Q. sigil with pride, your Snotty Highness, no Maelstrom man or otherwise will sign their resignation by trashing any goods marred with that accursed fear-plaque! Thank our deary mothers' for that!" The grousing shipman retorted by a signal to the princess's arm.

"You have no idea who I am! I'm the Daughter of someone very important!" The lightest athlete in the wave of men chucked the contents of a pike-length bucket and flashed a measly lizardskin-pelt through the breeze, but this time she was ignored.

"Aye, we've heard it all before." The subculture of hooligans carelessly weaseled out from her trick.

"Z.M.Q. knows all! He'll kill mothers or sisters of thieving pirates. Makes 'em scream three letters, Z.M.Q, then they can never swallow or blink, and he shows up randomly! Just last week I heard a tale of a Tayhojian lad of sixteen who's mom got it, she and her house were fine, valuables were left and everything. Only thing he signed with was a bag with 'is emblem on it, full of sixteen pieces of pure gold. Aye was it creepy listening to it, can't imagine what it was actually like. Apparently the pup was grown, he used to be a Maelstrom man too." Around the cluster, another hand joined in the prattle.

"They're not even afraid, not upset, no. Like the life is sucked right out of them! Oh they can swallow and blink, they just never do. Ever again." The beginning buccaneer braced his mop under his arms, shivering from the scandalous hearsay. More Maelstrom pirates drew to the Z.M.Q. wivestale like moths to torch. Jazhea gleaned a treacherous grin as she polished her lucky pendant clean. She set the ale canteen and the rubbing cloth down, preparing for another round to make her Amulet visible with good fortune.

"I'll have my Kingdom, and who cares what I have to do to achieve it." Jazhea piqued with a posturing puff. She palmed over her scarred shoulder and covered her mortified frown. "There can be only one, don't you understand?!" She loudly burbled once more.

"Konk understand, only one get ale." Konk sneakily trampled for the tankard, whisking it for the slop-chest. Jazhea brayed with a tantrum and tore out a lock of her braids.

"Stop it!" The loud-mouth suddenly squealed as she pulled for the bottle being torn from her wrapped fist.

"Konk have better use for it than stupid girlie!" Konk blathered with a dribbling lip as he detached his mahogany limb, smacking the tantamount pygmy until she released the handle into his hopping ownership. Jazhea's tantrum only aggravated.

Shifting his inspection to the side, another profile unattached from the ruckus lurked his way into a room from outside. He pushed through the doorway and sauntered into the dreary chamber in full. He greeted a large man who strew over the structure and feasted a gaze on a thin paper. The same character in view admired with one eye of yellow the uncustomary shape of a spiral confined in an inflated palm. He began to entreat. "I don't mean to interrupt, Bloth, Sir, but the men are complaining the Octopian girl has done nothing for us since we picked her up in Kalinda." Mantus stood at the edge of the table and sensibly discoursed to his captain. "They are saying if it goes on, they either want her to work like the rest of them or they want some form of...compensation." He creaked as he focused out the frame at the still-screaming harpy, who perceptibly had been permitted to do whatever she wished to the crew of the Maelstrom. The sneaky one's eyes switched to the vitreous jewel the broad one was scrutinizing, his stream-strained pupils widened.

"Bah." Bloth strayed a solo-beamed glance at his second-in-command and then revolved around to face him, obtaining a better vantage-point. "That's because she's done everything I wanted her to." The ruthless pirate elucidated with his appreciative gain, essentially jubilant to the skinny servant before him. He pinched the crystalline Treasure out to where Mantus could clearly see it. "My lucky woman-aboard has gotten me this fine gem by selling out her brother, for power." He stopped to chuckle a rich laugh. "She'll bring me the boy then I'll get him out of my way for good. I'll find the remaining Treasures and I'll find the ones that abhorrent dartha-sprout has hidden." He slammed his fist on the table to illustrate his reasoning, joyously rolling with a sinister delight. "I'll burn the boy's rotten city to the ground-again!" He diabolically ripped, adding as if in a cruel afterthought. He sped one iris to his advisor.

The loud shout that echoed from outward caused the wiry consultant to twitch his gawk momentarily. He blinked laggardly, beholding the female's form. Mantus stared deeply at the Treasure, the light hit on the curl and created a sharpened shine of royal purple. "Do you think she's really the boy's brother?" The sly consort posed with a grinding slither of air. "The daughter of that prominent and deceased King?" Mantus inflected as if in artful stewing.

"What do I care if she is or not?" Bloth chuckled a laugh. "I doubt it, but as long as she's willing to sell out her own kin, that is all that matters." He trailed with a growl as he picked up, slogging way to the outside. He desisted in his tracks as a great thump clattered of something being thrown nearby.

Mantus aimed blue through the exit at the woman who had been causing so much trouble. "It's a shame about the wench. Her voice grates like a razorbeak maw, but she looks to be breakable for our deck. May give it a nice contrast, even." The simmer of the commander hung gruff as he fiddled with a satchel of coins that he shifted at his side. "I find it to be peculiar the form of her dagron is fluent like Instructor's. Bloth, maybe it would be a good idea to keep our wench alive, she may be more valuable to the Son of Primus after she has endured some yielding wear from us. Should, say, the boy outstandingly throw a debacle into our indefectible operation. We should know our enemy, don't you think?" The strategist respectably requested to negotiate a change of battle plan.

The big man shot a crooked eye at him. "Our deck is fine!" Bloth indignantly rebutted. "Her look is only fair and she reminds me too much of that insolent boy. She's a fine dagron pilot but does us no more of an asset than any other, worse, if she cannot see a leviathan or the Maelstrom at full gale. She would bring me the Treasures from Ren and then trick him into revealing the secret of the final Treasure. That was the only condition of her survival and freedom. If she is unable to do that, then there is no reason to keep her around." The Pirate Lord grumbled lowly, crass and intolerable.

"Perhaps, but reconsider it, Bloth. She may be more useful to us in learning about the Treasure from home than Ioz or that lousy Andorian wench would be." Mantus willfully argued.

"Did I just hear you speak of Traitor Ioz without reason, Mantus?" Bloth's tone became wholly sharp and aggressive.

"My mistake, Bloth." Mantus swiftly swept his blunder.

"Her life is of the expendable variety. If she was able to accumulate Ren's knowledge at all, then she will have it already. That boy is as trusting as Maalagar's falls are crooked. I see no need for authorizing any Persuasive Boarding, or...Treatment. If we're going to talk of wenches to keep, I'd much prefer Tula. At the very least, that woman can scheme. If she wasn't so involved with that repugnant brat. My how that woman can scheme..." Bloth raised his fist, his volume resumed a less abrasive melody.

"It's not that I want her alive. Even when our toll to the Faceless One is covered and paid, we are in need of more help. We're not giving this enough time. I believe I know how I can keep her out of the way, if you don't want her, Bloth." Mantus manipulated suggestively, anticipating the reap of his machination.

Bloth paused when he was ready to walk out the door. "We'll be stopping in port soon enough, Mantus. There will be plenty of dupable wharf-rats to lift-and-dive there. Get back to work, before I dock your pay by two gold instead of one." The beastly man glared at the underling in warning and growled under his breath as he closed the door behind him.

The skies clouded over, not close to stormy as a petite watercraft near a chain of islands pushed forth over choppy waves.

"Tula, we need less sail!" Ren ordered solidly from the controls, the Wraith had been swaying from beam to fore and aft. It demanded a bit of steering to stabilize and still lurched forward with difficulty. "How is the water, Niddler?" He shouted to the monkeybird angled at the trim of the ship.

"Still clear!" Niddler cawed back satisfactorily.

"This should help!" Tula called out from high aloft as she adjusted the stray sail and slid down.

"That melon is starting to stink, Niddler. Eat it, or throw it overboard." Another rouse sought from an innermost spot. Tula welcomed a glance at the stretching swashbuckler.

"Next time we're in Pandaawa, we need to thank the Queen and her people for their generosity but they really overstocked us with more than we can handle this time." The ecomancer commented sedately. Niddler shrugged his humdrum wings then lifted up to expel the smelly melon from the board.

"If I know Bloth, she doesn't have long." Ren fastened solely on the singular aim of his own. He noticed that something had changed when he gazed up into the starry heavens. The number of people he needed to help was piling up. Instead of finding solutions like before, Ren found he would come across those he could not help. If he couldn't locate the source of the darkwater blacklash, he was positive Mer would likewise remain doomed. He counted constellations above his person, the multi-colored specks of the starscape reminding him of the Treasures themselves. Why did his father have to charge him with such a difficult task?

Ioz paced out from the cabin where he sojourned to take a break and aspired for the contemplative youth at the wheel. The ship flew in a heave, in between going West and South as if the captain troubled with concentrating. "Ren, you know where we're going, right? She's going to be there, regardless of whether she defended or plundered. It's the only base that make sense this far out to sea. When you crew on Bloth's deck for any moonrise you learn dagrons can't fly forever." The experienced sailor whispered levelly to Ren at the helm.

Ren tore his eyes at the one who addressed him and gave out a settled nod. "We don't know where the Maelstrom is headed, but it couldn't have docked." The prince rationalized with vigilance, not worrying about the potential of losing the goal. If Jazhea was traitorous, then the possibility the warship would advance from the opposite direction she instructed was likely. He fostered a vibe which told him, the consolidated target would be found anyway. He cradled the Compass tenderly in his hands, it flared up and indicated to the South. He whisked a hard turn and shifted the wheel. Unfortunately, the wind thrashed and started to pick up. The gale fanned in the wrong direction.

"Jitatan Bloth, Mantus...these are the best repairs we're going to get on the high-seas of Pandaawa's boonies, Ren." Ioz swore as he swung a hammer at planking to cover the loose boards where Grimrot had made his worm-oozing self home.

"We may have to wait this one, out, Ren." Tula gauged the flow from the tier, coming to the conclusion of her disabled efforts to make the vessel shove faster. Her brow showed worry. She minded the sky at the clouds beginning to turn, it looked like rain would soon be trickling down.

"You know, Ren, I was thinking finding these Treasures involves a more effective plan. Maybe Jazhea can't do us any real harm should she ally herself with our enemy, but who knows what she's telling him right now." Ioz tacitly approached Ren, but his contention endured with all earnestness. Ren would believe his decisions weren't being trusted.

"Provided we can resolve it, and what does she have to give Bloth besides our Treasure?" Ren unwillingly argued over Ioz's confrontation. No wondering of the reasoning behind Jazhea's disappearance would do any good.

"More, she took Delta with her. That slum-wench doesn't know bilge but Mantus is going to receive a Treasure soon, for a...trade. Which means someone from Bloth's crew is working for the ruthless pirate Z.M.Q., and someone is being delivered to him. I have the feeling what she told us may mean something to someone who can understand, and if I were a betting man I'd say Bloth could have the very same idea." Ioz was establishing his sturdy opinion. Ren hassled quickly to and fro.

"Ioz, take the wheel." Ren burst out vehemently and bumped away as if he saw something. He left the spindle as Ioz took over and he mounted the net up to the crow's nest with the Treasure clasped tight. Ren sat in the rope webbing and scoured the sealine, over the boundary he procured a deviating black puddle. The blemish couldn't be detected before, but somehow he sensed the stagnation had been there. He then realized the scale of a Treasure hummed a singing melody in his hand. He understood it might be telling him to wait. He suspected a flying entity levitating in the skies above the dark mass, but then it faded into the mist. His pure eyes strained to find the abnormal aerial-occurrence, but failed.

"What do you see up there, Ren?" The inquisitive monkeybird on deck cawed to him from below. He belted a Pandaawa-originated minga-melon in his arms as he took a break from the action.

"By the Warlocks of Draja! How am I supposed to concentrate with you rolling minga-melons all over the jitatan deck, monkeybird?" Ioz rapidly lost all wits at the antics and noises of Niddler with the orphan-brigade.

"But-" Niddler bickered unwillingly and nagged as he ached. The twins saddened but followed directives as they were told.

"I don't care if it makes them sweeter, roll the jitatan fruit below deck-where I can't hear it." Ioz supremely relented, unable to resist Lus-nayi's burdened eyes.

"Nothing, Niddler." Ren sighed in disappointment and shuffled his way down the shroud, rebounding as he gripped closer to the borca-pasted floor. He locked to face something in the horizon, his perception worked more diligently than before.

"Now he has sea-water in his eyes, just what we need." Ioz grumbled as he craned the still slowly back and forth.

"I don't really blame him, Ioz, I can't imagine what I would do if I was told to carry out what Jenna told Ren. It's not so easy making the right decisions. Give him a break." Tula stood up for Ren as he descended to the planking. She strove to smooth waters before discord between friends turned into a mutiny. Ioz knew Tula's point was static, if he didn't believe Ren's new relation to be a cold-blooded traitor.

"Then if I'm wrong, we'll make sure she does no harm again. I promise. No matter the cost." Ren was unflappable when he posed his judgment. Still, he sighed and continued to mind the chilling eddy. "Ioz, can you go lightly South-West?" He cemented in center, immersed as he requested a path from the pirate who drove the schooner.

"Take it easy, Ren. No one has taken a break, Ioz is stressed like we are." Tula trekked over, wearily concerning herself with the younger skipper. "Strange. Life. Below deck." Her eyes tipped to an alien movement within the hull.

"I'll try." Ioz obliged as he purled the keel against the wind. Out of the mist, something admitted vision in the far distance. It appeared to be a cloud of dusty gray. The neutral and habitual shape bulged in contrast to the rest of the sky and began to morph. It floated closer, perpendicular to the Wraith.

"There it is." Ren pronounced, absolute in his estimate. The others saw it too, heads bounced in the same direction.

"It might be better for us to sneak aboard. If he sees the Wraith, he'll be on to us." Ioz motioned a plot as he propped upon the stairs of the upperdeck. The leviathan-bone vessel drudged at grievous velocity for it's size, it disappeared into the obscurity of the vapor then reappeared with more visibility.

Ren clarified conceptions in his head. "Right. Good idea, Ioz. Someone will have to stay on the Wraith." Ren declared as Tula discerned him curiously. Leaning down to the feathered-friend beside him, Ren gently appealed to Niddler. "Niddler. We need you to protect the Wraith, but don't give away the Treasure." Ren, whom normally conversed calmly with the monkeybird, orated with all seriousness now. "Even if Jazhea comes back, don't give it to her. Don't give it to Delta either. Do you understand?" He handed the sanguine-feathered primate the Treasure, kindly but sternly vocalizing his expectations.

"I understand, Ren." Niddler accepted with a demure gesture and put the scale he was given out of sight. "I won't tell a sea-sucker I have it." He reassured and saluted the regal, who he sensed disconcerted over what he precedently did.

"This plan is great, Ioz. He won't fight us when we bring this slug to the Maelstrom." Ren eagerly lit up with a shrewd temper, popping open the levithan-hide canteen to check for the cryptic slug's pulse. "Just wait until he gets a load of this!" The motivated captain prized the significant wild-card in his arsenal.

"This is serious, lad! We're not going to dangle that thing everywhere under the jitatan Merrian-Sun! Especially when we don't even know what it will do!" Ioz himself called to be sure Ren and his impulsive penchant understood every potential reprecussion of the idea he had suggested.

"I know, Ioz, but don't worry. When we have something like this creature as our weapon, Bloth will have a hard time arguing." Ren guaranteed eveyone while he flapped the lid and closed it for battle. "Remember though, don't let it out unless you need to use it." Ren rendered a spry caution with a hint of his knowing brow to the more troublesome of the teammates.

"That barnacle-eater is not going to be let out by my sword." Ioz vowed as he sealed the cap on the slug and slung the canister over his shoulder, ready for embarkment.

"We'll take the slug." Tula sported a healthy stride for the frontier's bend, fit to dive.

"Then we'll go!" Ioz moved to vault off the platform and into the water with the ship's only scout before Tula stopped him.

"Wait!" Tula alerted, hypothesizing on a snappy inkling. "It's going to be a long ride, I have a plan. I need to borrow this." The ecomancer argued sagacity as she picked up a rope and board laid on the deck to be used for repairs and nudged it into the water, lunging in after. Ioz delivered her a doubtful scour but the men followed through. Tula sat up on the board, which was justifiably spacious enough for the three of them. "If I can manipulate the current, we can reach our destination faster and we'll have more horizon if we moor our scout to the Wraith!" She promoted with zeal as she began to crackle her energy on the water. The liquid vivified and veered up, forming a swishing wave behind the flat to propel forward.

"Good thinking, Tula. We'll leave the scout-dory close for our return." Ren extolled after knotting the line to the ledge and helping his enchanted ally paddle.

"So we're doing this again." Ioz audibly mumbled below his breath. Ren goggled quizzically after the mention of Ioz's thought. Out in the close current they boarded the buoy. "This is how she got us there last time." The rogue securely mentioned, Ren nodded understandingly.

"That's far enough, Tula. Save your energy for Bloth." Ren conducted to his standing female companion, he noticed the ecomancer starting to tire. The trinity paddled the remainder of the way upon the makeshift buoy and were coming upon close vicinity to enemy territory, keeping to port-beam. It couldn't be wise to risk approaching from the bow and getting drawn into the ducts of the sewerway.

Niddler watched the plank disappear into the horizon as it shrunk into the heavy and spiking cluster of bones standing out from the haze. He nibbled the last bite of the melon, having near-totally hollowed it. With his other hand he spied his avian eyes of green at the scale, winking with one lid to get a good view. In another idea, he pushed the curved shard into the rind of the melon. "That should do." He professed proudly to himself. He heard an erratic noise somewhere close and he wheeled his elongated neck with forethought. Upon closer inspection, he saw the sheave on the halyard left ill-adjusted. "That's funny. Tula always does a good job." He commended of ascertained faith. Carrying the melon husk, he fluttered up to fix the error. He touched down on the deck after, and resumed the enjoyment of his short vacation.

The wooden slab before an expansive wall of bone wobbled undertow as three travelers endeavored to grab hold of the smooth and oversized skeleton of a ship before them. The ridging peak was swallowed by clouds. There were a few loose planks on the massive hull, on which a bronze descendant used to balance himself and ultimately scale the framework.

Tula jounced below on the spare part. The water plowed it, almost about to overthrow it but the shifting stopped when she latched her hand tightly against the stable wood of the floating fortress. The young man a headway above her caught her hand. "Noy jitata, it's going to be a long climb up." The roving woman observed. "Ren, don't go too far." She mutely called out to her crewmate, who now escalated at least one, maybe two full lengths ahead of her.

"It's okay Tula, I'm going ahead." Ren softly asserted above a whisper in return to her. They were not even close to the top. The only remaining wayfarer on the board mounted the trimmings, proceeding to catch up to Tula. The waves below whipped as the abandoned timber drifted away from the hulk of the Maelstrom. The three climbed tirelessly and stealthily up the bulwark. All did everything feasible to preserve energy. When at last reaching the outstretching spikes of the rail, which were fortunately profuse enough to obscure heads, each spied around and carefully watched the precinct. Three men were standing guard, one tall and another skinny, a third was punier but burly. Two men and one woman waited for the right moment. Whispering quietly amongst themselves, Ren, Tula and Ioz prepared to attack the band. Then, an exclamation clattered from the direction nearer to the bow and the trio of watchmen trudged off. Sweat from the silent adventurers subsided. The hidden crew straddled the way over the barrier of the port base and quickly tapped on tiptoe to duck behind a row of barrels. Someone approached from behind, the triad flinched.

"Smool-brain! Bloth wants the lantern below. Why is it still up here?" The gnarling voice bickered.

"Me was just getting to it! Me want to talk to Bloth now! Please!" The second and immediate lackey groaned and shuffled midship-bound.

"You can talk to him, after, you take the lantern away. Do it, Now, or you'll have dagron-mucking duty tomorrow, Double Shift!" The ultimatum of the taller shadow growled as it marched the squat man away in counter.

"Yes, master." The short man muttered unwillingly, the sounds depreciated.

Ren ignored the receding Konk-and-Mantus affair and focused on business. "Ioz, Tula." The flaxen-tipped thinker of the group gradually hinted. "Navigate along the stern and opposite sides of the ship. I'll scour the deck and try to find the Treasure and Jazhea. Try to stay out of sight if you see her, we'll meet back here later." Ren tacitly directed to his shipmates from behind the receptacle.

"Ren, Bloth is up that way!" Ioz protested discreetly to him, not agreeing with the risky scenario.

"I know that but I won't get caught, Ioz." Ren privately argued amidst his allies to reassure. "I have to find the Treasure-now go!" The pony-tailed blond gave his last order as he saw an opportunity to move and with a quick patter of boots, dashed behind an abundant crate in an impending zoom for the front of the freighter. He rendered the trimmed sword out of his boot and braced it, vacillating eyes for any sign of danger.

"Ay chunga, he's as crazy as a one-toothed korba-cat." Ioz murmured in irritated silence. "You heard him, Tula. We'll take the ladderway to the galley, better to steer clear of Z.M.Q.'s bug plagues so we're not infested." Ioz instructed his female crewmate and dragged her hand as her lips moved to say something under her breath. Tula refrained in a shared burden of the dangerous slug and followed her senior behind a pile of rigging equipment.

From behind a wooden alcove, the youthful noble remained immersed in the course of sneaking around on the ship of his adversary. Ren observed his newest target with valor. In only less than a moment, the sight loomed into the boy's field of view. Ren unobtrusively listened and watched. The floorboards clicked and tapped as an unevenly walking individual doddered way across the panorama of the deck to rest against the outward fence, at last plopping down to sit. Eyes shot for something the prince's view blockaded.

"Screaming wench won't shut mouth. Me only glad because sister of stupid boy give Konk break for once." Konk slouched and glowered with his back against the side support of the Maelstrom, grumbling to himself. He fetched in his hand a bottle of ale and frequently broke from his slurring to pour some of it down his throat. He then glared ever more disgusted at something. "Me hope she get thrown to Constrictus." He reluctantly bewared his carelessness with wishes and followed himself up. "No, then Konk might get thrown to Constrictus after Bloth attention go to Konk next. Bah!" He stifled on the paradox of his dilemma and took another swallow of his ale, hurling the bottle away with frustration.

Confirmed, Ren thought. Jazhea was here, somewhere. Most likely she would be just up ahead, and she could have the Treasure with her. He needed to take care of the pegleg who stood in his way, somehow. Without really thinking about it, he did one thing foolish. "Konk!" Ren shouted only loud enough for the pirate-runt to hear him as he hauled out from behind the crate and tackled, knocking the grubby whelp over. He occupied his half-sword in psuedo-threatening fashion over the piglet's fat neck. "Where is she?" He vehemently demanded.

Konk stared at his honeyed enemy with a startled gaze and pointed to the bow with a flabby arm. The piglet had been about to yell out, but sensing this, the boy managed to push him off into a stockpile of crates. Konk felt sore after bashing his head but he was otherwise okay.

"Prepare to be Starfished! Even the Beard of Daven has not seen anything like this! One! Two! Three!" Ren's heart jerked at an abrupt excitement. Witnessed staring right for the lad was the Securitat raider from Pandaawa. The starfishuriken splatted into an adjacent post about a monkeybird's wingspan away from the royalty.

"This 'here is your standard-issue Starzooka. It's easy, ye see." Nearby, an ensign sailor began instructing a new recruit. "Now, ye wanna make sure yer loaded' and how you do this is, ya just pull back the lever and if ya feel something squishy, yer go!" He demonstrated a sling cartridge of a canon he possessed over his shoulder. "But ya wanna lock it into place and make sure yer starfish don't escape. So ye click it..." The enemy wayfarers were pointed toward the sea as a tick sounded. "Then when ya wanna fire, ya just pull 'her back and...launc-aaaahhhhh!" The ensign and the newcomer dropped to the floor with hand-thrown starfish splatting yelping mouthes.

"Four! Five! Six!" Pirates were now alerted at the screams and charged forward but all proceeded to be slammed with the sticky projectiles.

"Oww!" The now fleeing Konk yowled from behind the agitator, ejecting into to the sky to rip an asterozoa from his rump.

"Seven! Eight! Nine!" Three more musclebound pirates hit the floor at the cry. "Ten!" Reotozz invigorated into a grand finale.

"Aye! 'Me is done peelin' potatoes, someone be a mate an' tell Capt' Blot-" Sounds of a blithe cheer instantly halted. Ren temporarily veered to obtain sight of Bloth's potatopeeler unconscious on the deck with an oozy starfishuriken stuck to the back of his head.

"Ahoy, Prince Ren! Prepare to die an Agonizing and Impressive death at the sword of the Worthy Reotozz!" Reotozz advanced with a busting giggle and the drawing of a sharp broadsword at the exhaustion of the starfishuriken. Ren blinked, then dunked Reotozz headfirst into a barrel of fish and moved on.

Ren realized his mistake and tried to correct it by catching Konk to throw him overboard but the pegleg had already hobbled off in the opposite direction, a cunning smile gracing his chubby lips. Ren fumbled in cogitation and scrambled up a stairway of cubes, positioning overtop one of the cabin structures. "Scot pango." The swear solemnly escaped his muffled lips. Ren flurried to cast a gander at the map of his own crew, wondering of the Maelstrom's route. He could be fairly certain no able pirates in the proximity had witnessed him, but his presence would be alerted soon. Imperatively, he needed to find his sister. He skimmed along the narrow rooftop, promptly ducking down and contending to stay hidden.

"Why are we betraying the people who helped us out? Let me go!" Not far off, Delta squirmed when she helplessly exerted to free herself and kicked out into stale sky. She shrieked at the simple suggestion of falling.

"I want to see her thrown, Bloth! She can't possibly help obtain the Treasures from Ren!" Nearby, another female inspired the hand to drop her abandoned collaborator into the chasmal breach nether. Bloth did as he was going to do anyway, a militaristic stranger smiled at having just disposed of her scorned friend to the acidic jowls beneath. Mantus's frigid gawk momentarily flickered on the bloodthirsty traitor.

Concealed behind stacks of supplies, two figures watched two more from hiding spots. The obsidian-haired man and almond-eyed woman had skulked way around the tail of the mammoth cruiser to among the opposite side of the platform entered. With revulsion they uneasily abode as the voices resonated.

"So, my friend, when do I get to rule?" Prodded the badgering words of a girl with plaits stringing down from edges of a fragile face. She smirked sweetly upward at an overshadowing and inhumanly-pale ransacker above. Nearby stood a league of pillagers, who were slinking the lass glances of awaiting vengeance.

The evil authority who rested his hulking arm around the dame's shoulders bellowed a deep chuckle. "Just as soon as you bring me your brother and the Treasures I require to give Octopon to you, my dear." Bloth bent to respond to her, masking daggers through a candied demeanor.

Jazhea started a high-pitched and piercing laugh, essentially intolerable. "You're so sweet, Captain Bloth. I'll let you take the rest of Mer. I just want Octopon for myself to be Queen over." The estranged princess addressed him in such a snide superiority, ignorant spectators would be hard-pressed to differentiate the true holder of the chaos reins.

"This traitorous dartha-eel of a woman is turning my stomach." Ioz growled like poison filled his ears, he quietly waited from behind a column of barrels that were tied back with rope.

"You're not the only one. For a princess she's very intrusive." Tula concurred gratingly. Her eyes pointed in a putrid stare at the golden-haired informer she spied in front of her.

"So where have you left your brother and his ship, my dear?" The monstrous captain asked the tenderly-forged woman, an insincere smile of coated sugar planted on his pallid lips.

"Hah!" Jazhea puffed, sweeping away the very concept. She fluttered her eyes to the side, away from his stare. "I left him and his smool-brained friends stranded out among those islands somewhere. Not that it matters, they all left their silly ship anyway. They're about as brainless as a bilge-wasted slime-dump." She confidently grinned and though she boasted boldly, her strong gaze was now beginning to peak in a show of weakness. Bloth solicited interest in this information.

"Really?" The gargantuan glutton hissed. He now leaned down to look straight at her and forced her expression to meet his, yearning to know more. Jazhea peered away subtly.

"An ego as big as her forehead. He's not going to keep her alive for long." Tula bit under her breath, teeth cinched fixedly against her lips. Her pulse shuddered at every motion as she watched the conversation play out.

Without warning, a supernatural sound and a cast of a silhouette entered the area. It reached the two people discussing business. Only the bizarre umbra of the shape extended out with any visibility from the narrow window between stacks of barrels which allowed the sneaky shipmates to eavesdrop. The noise, a hiss could be heard.

"Bloth. The Son of Primus has been detected within close proximity. His ship is not far." The familiar utterance was exposed. The sound simulated an unfathomable sibilate of a reptile, kindred to that of a snake or a banished specter.

Bloth ripped his attention away from Jazhea and glared at the oddly-figured creature who approached. "Where Morpho?" The Captain insisted, sharp and with no leniency for slack.

"Come." Morpho hissed crucially. He led away with Bloth in tow, who followed sword-brandished and stomping. The twain grotesque beings fled too quickly for Ioz and Tula to effect a glimpse of the repugnant disciple, but they garnered an idea of what was going on.

"What?" Tula gestured with flabbergasted green pools. Her edginess slowly faded, she drew in a tremorous breath. "How would he know?" She whispered with bewilderment to the friend next to her.

"I don't know, but I think I have a plan." Ioz rapidly blazed with pensive motivation. His eyes now shuffled to Jazhea, who transparently lingered along in the opposite line with an ear to the enclosed panel as if trying to listen to something. The scandalous agent then bent down with a noise, as if she were straining to breathe. The ecomancer and the pirate watched her peculiarly. "Tula. We have to get back to Ren. We have to tell him. That sea-weasel is looking for trouble and she's going to find it. Come on." Ioz hurried out like a gale. He clasped Tula by the wrist and then by the hand as the pair shot for the prior-agreed meeting place.

"You forgot one thing...a little rot in your night!" With a morbid squall the coming catastrophe surfaced on the slimy bone-ladder of the Maelstrom, the only fixture which could support Grimrot's fungus.

"Grimrot! How did he find us, Mantus must be near!" Tula invoked her control of the flurry but to no consequence when Grimrot pursued the living hearts. Cankered skin prevailed in creeping toward the stunted spell-binder. Grimrot retracted and latched his claws of death at Tula's blanched cheek. Tula and Ioz embraced as they watched for their demise. Unexpectedly, a bright blur cut out of a befogged crevice.

Nimbo deflected a thin ray of sunlight through the clouds on to his rapier and as Grimrot screeched, he burst to dust.

"He's vulnerable to the sunlight!" Tula and Ioz witnessed the bane's oblivion first-hand. She fleetingly purused the red-clad archer who showed her a saving gleam and prevented her from being devoured by Grimrot's demonic fungus.

In hidden pathways on floorboards and camouflaged corners of the ship, the sand-haired prince shimmied. He surveyed for any indication of his sister and the Treasure she would be toting with her. He saw a few spots below his standing which were unguarded, so he skittered down to duck himself behind crates.

Ren had been caught in traversing his way to the front-side when he saw a golden flash receding in his trail, it hugged the walls as it hopped by. She appeared to be searching for something but he just could identify the back of her head. She did not see him and a few cutthroats were currently guarding the pathway between the siblings. He dashed for another adjacent barrel with the purport to slip past them. He was careless. The steel swung at him and he narrowly averted. Ren had been forced to back up, which in turn propelled him to plunge backward over a crate. The contents then spilled to the floor. He tried to find any form of cover and could locate none. He skedaddled from the area, running after her waning frame and edging to catch up with her. "Jazhea wait! Help is on the way!" He severely called out for her. Ren only sighted her twist him the smile of a trickster and then she scampered off and out of his view. Ren knew he would be in trouble when he rebelled too loudly, but he now would have his hands full with more than seven buccaneers schlepping in to clobber him with weapons. He spiraled around with a kick, which met place with two rubes. He heard a laugh from behind him. The runt scud about the maindeck when he exposed Ren, the pegleg snorted stupidly at the aristocrat's missed attempts to attack him.

"Go away, Konk." The fretting prince muttered under his tapering rhythm. Ren snatched hold of a barrel which previously disarranged itself across the floorboards of the deck and discarded it on the piglet to bowl him over. He then caused something of a scene without his notice as he tried to decamp, but became engrossed in the melee. He scooted for the corner he saw Jazhea reel around, he desired to return to where his friends would meet him. Another stray troublemaker's sword stuck out at him, weakly slanting for his throat. Ren hampered it with his own shortened blade. He struggled to brawl the intruder away from him until another hazard caught his arms. Ren's hand scorched in a spasm and forcibly dropped the hilt. "Noy jitat! Let me go!" The prince rioted, shouting with fire behind his blitz. He throttled kicks into barren air. The piglet in front of him grinned with a sly leer. Ren jittered as he felt a gross hand contact with his upper back.

"It looks like the Son of Primus has bailed from his own ship to mine. You're always managing to make your way here, prince." The detestable captain coldly taunted Ren as the boy jut around to meet his nemesis with furor. Beside him stood the miscreation and the commander. The evil plunderer tore the turquoise gem off the boy's neck. All the hellions abound laughed and jeered accordingly.

Ren's blue eyes inflamed. He rallied against the pirates holding him back, summoning resistance. Bloth's men were too strong and he was too weak, puny in comparison. Ren glared at the swarm of robbers gaping upon him with malignant and toothless fleers. "You mean how you never stop this wickedness, you kreld-eater? I came for the Treasure you took!" The stalwart prince stormily cursed at the villain through gritted teeth.

"You are the one trespassing on my ship, prince. Although, I can't say I am anything but delighted you are." Bloth leaned down to chuckle and gloat in the offending chap's face, glowering directly into his diverting eyes. "You saved me the trouble of hunting you down myself, which is pleasant because your celebrated death will come..." He refrained as if trawling to obtain the right word. "Easily." He let the blackened sound sink in his heroic rival's ears. He contemptuously sneered down at his righteous foe with a cruel glim of yellow, the worrying way he spoke made the heir uneasy. The large pillager reposed once more. "Lock him away! Search him for the Treasure, I'll deal with him later. Now, I need to find the Wraith and that blasted crew of his..." Bloth shunned with a turn of his back on Ren and glinted his destructive sword in the air as if inspecting it for blemishes.

"No!" Ren protested being led away, he flailed and hollered. "Ay jitata, you won't get away with it! I swear you'll be celebrating your own soon, naja-dog! Let me go!" He swore and pelted his heel, fighting at the constraining minion's ankles, who only grunted at him and roughed him up more to prevent him from rebelling. The flame inside him left and he dejectedly cast down his eyes. The marauders were warding him away to the brig of the Maelstrom.

In a small corner hidden from where the capture had taken place, a beige-skinned stranger watched the whole event through a prying of sage. "Death?" She fearfully murmured under her breath and slunk away unseen.

The dank warroom was empty apart from a prize of spiral trove and a map situated on the table. The door busted open with a bang. Three figures trooped inside, advancing toward the map.

"Mantus! Set course for the prince's ship!" Bloth stomped into the headquarters with Mantus at his side and Morpho escorting the way, he collected the Treasure off the shelf where it had been placed and clattered to his commanding officer.

"Where, Milord?" The emaciated subordinate at edge of the table besought genially, needing to know where he should be heading.

"Thirty lengths off the shore of this island! It will not take any time at all..." Morpho's sinister hiss sprawled like vitiating plague as he pinched and erected the map between shriveled fingers that were in connection, he communed with a crooked tentacle where the objective had last been determined by the dark water.

"Halt. You will need to follow beyond the Straits of Heron, where the dark water conjoins with Maalagar's current, to avoid incoordination in the quake sector. Plummeting into the abysmal falls would have grave consequences and cause very much...Discord." The villainous party desisted their movements with a stricken gape as a new evil panned into the imbruing framework.

"Yes, Master!" Morpho temporally roamed to the black pool affixed in the central locate of the chamber to bestow his devotion to the deathly lord. He raised a nearby staff and knelt to the Dark Dweller. Mantus and Bloth paced to the brim of the arcane circle where the source convened.

"Should we open and employ the box of doom on them, Bloth?" The abrasive helmsman requested amid a peruse of the enclosed rink of dark water.

"Why would we want to do that? We'll wait to tap into our...Network." The Captain granted the obedient Mantus a sour negative.

"It's true evil things come to those who wait." Mantus broadened with his concession.

Morpho arranged the parchment in former placement on the slab and digressed to the Pirate Lord. "The Test." The collaborator ushered the isolated word in a reptilian mutter, Bloth acknowledged and motioned with one eye. The deformed revenant and the brute tromped out of the room and onto the deck, leaving the door cracked by a minuscule margin. Mantus was the last to remain.

Mantus stayed, eying the map and searching the unusual area of Mer for the location of his charge. He glared at Morpho but the subcreature left without reaction. The later moments followed and a lone woman scurried into the room, having evidently been waiting outside the door. She shot an overcast peek at the haggard enforcer. She set sight on the map in front of her. To her grimace, he returned her a stare.

"Hello wench." The commander greeted her with a kind of gaze which was wickedly calculating. "How many years older are you than your brother?" He pried with suspicion. She could only glimpse at the intentioned grin he wore on his wilted face.

"Two." Jazhea truthfully alleged, forcibly darting eyes at the discomforting source.

"You're the Daughter of Primus, I hear?" The troublesome man investigated her as if contemplating something.

"Yes, and I know who you are." Jazhea yammered with a sly smirk. Her green eyes maintained their wander to the interestingly-drawn map.

Mantus crowed with a snide expression. "Then you know of my important job." The sneaky con cunningly strung his words. "Bloth often needs me to be the mind behind his...endeavors." His gruff snort crackled from his throat as he studied her.

"If I let him know you said that, would he agree?" Jazhea simpered to charming graces. She only removed her gaze from him once as she battled wits, she put the front on hard. She sensed he didn't buy it.

The bettor snorted. "Bloth currently does not care much for Konk, and Konk has much better than my shipmate Strand. Do you think these are uncommon, woman?" Jazhea peered at the questioning troublemaker, Mantus now cradled in his palm a medium-sized clam-shell. "Seen one before?" He followed up, Jazhea skeptically acknowledged with her eyes.

"What are you getting at? The only person I know who used to have them was Jargis of Pandaawa." Jazhea modishly offered.

"Ah, Jargis and myself deal in very similar trades." Mantus slickly responded with the nod of his oblong head.

"Jargis deals in monkeybirds and you deal in..." Jazhea challenged from an angle, nervous about something of the way he said the phrase.

"Dagrons, of course. All for Sport." The collected thief nasalized, his chuckle affirmed.

"Right." Jazhea accepted with accordance, barely above a whisper.

"Off-duty." The standoffish man soon tacked on.

"Off-duty." Jazhea repeated, starkly.

"I'll clarify, colorful flora. The Maelstrom is no place for a maiden voyage. You need an advocate for protection, someone with knowledge. You want gold to buy your leave, or someone back. If you want to persuade Bloth I have the wealth and power you seek. It's not easy or cheap." Mantus moderately proposed. "The gold this is worth is all yours if you can best me at the pit today. Willing to take the chance?" He genially interviewed, exhibiting the shell in front of her. Jazhea allot a glance, unsure of nerve. "Don't fear. Even if you do lose, we'll be going to Drakkle's gambling tavern when we come to port. It's directly across from Zoolie's in Janda-town. We can discuss further arrangements over a barrel of grog. Think about it." Mantus calmly extended his invitation, but his audience could not erase the harassing facade he wore. Jazhea backed slightly away.

"I wasn't raised by a noble standing to be anyone's fool, pirate. I desire the crown of Octopon, what favor will remaining on this jitatan pirate-ship do me?" With an overt eloquence Jazhea staidly cemented as she shifted eyes to the cause of her stress. This man was a bettor, an obsessive one. She once lost all her gold to him and came into trouble thinking she could win one of his contests but she had not put more on the table than what she could pay off, unlike her poor predecessors. "I'm living for my own, not your employer. My wish is to leave here, and if I have to throw someone under the ship to do so, then so be it." She puffed as she crossed her arms.

"Come now, why do you not lift your shoulder when you are worn to the bone? Don't tell me you have an arranged meeting with another commander. I haven't yet heard an Aye-Aye from you, yet you know who has the power to send you back to whom you truly belong. You forget who owns your live here." Jazhea almost stepped upon the circling of pooling black-sea in the chamber to escape Mantus's wisecracking pat of her clenched shoulders. She cleaved both hands over the brim of her white ruffle as she spun around in a frantic circle.

"Wait, by Daven's beard! You're that evil second-in-command! The old one, I thought Bloth had gotten rid of you for-" Jazhea's eyes jarred wide open, her feet fearfully ricocheted at her slip. The name of her poor predecessor mouthed out from her lungs...the scapegoat she knew was in debt to Mantus with a deal which could neither be won nor paid off. She flushed ashen pale as she restrained herself from shrieking too loudly then, she felt a tough hand smack a portion unguarded by her arms.

"You're too narrow in the flank to be riding dagrons, woman." The blademaster only grunted with a disturbing sneer as he bestirred forward with a mouth lacking in teeth. "That should cover it. If you tell me what Phorlock told you, you won't have to d-" Mantus pointed a sharp claw within his succedent motion. He pierced gleaming eyes at the flat jewelry about his flouting presence's neck. Before he could speak again his hand trailed to the sheath at his waist as if by some habit, but he composed himself. He imagined a clank when his nail slipped. The pungent swordsman's concept desisted when he heard his name being called from the deck and hastily reeled his neck about.

"Mantus!" The Captain roared to order him outside.

"Yes, Milord!" The commander blurted out a hoarse shout. Mantus took his cue to go. He waffled and sped away, giving the woman in the room a crooked scrutiny before he clouted the door behind him.

"Hm." Jazhea huffed. She peered down at the keyring the plunderer had lost in a hurry and speedily pocketed it with a gleam. She swung around to yield to the chart and she was astounded by what she witnessed, she clapped it up in her arms. She distinguished five locations on the map, two of which were blurred out. "This must be..." She whispered to herself. "Noy jitat, it can't be! How does Bloth know where Ren is going?" She quietly mouthed and awed under stifled breath. She rolled up the map, concealing it on her as she snuck out of the chamber.

Rain had began to trickle down on the commodious deck as many swabbie freebooters hollered and shouted across the breadth. The ship steered brusquely, almost too quickly imminent of a secluded section ahead.

"We'll board the boy's ship when we drop in! We'll take the Treasure and then we'll burn it all to cinders!" Bloth roared out atrocious plots as he stood by the helm of the Maelstrom, which his commander navigated through arduous conditions. "Perhaps I'll make the Son of Primus watch his own destruction." He smiled sinfully as he mused on this spark, toying with the idea.

"Bloth, this wind is horrendous! We won't be there until many lengths yet!" Mantus, his commander, informed in response. He was unable to do anything about the rain and windstorm. The skies were flaring up. Bloth remorselessly growled.

"Stay on course! I want that Treasure! Quickly! The longer he stays in my captivity, the more likely his rotten crew will intercede!" The Captain unrelentingly dictated, he abode with his arms in a prowl toward the sea as if he could take it all for himself.

"That might not be possible, Bloth!" Mantus's imploring reaction squalled to his master. The gale thrashed as if in a cyclone.

"Then, make it possible!" Bloth's unforgiving agenda did not bend as he threatened the underling.

"Aye-Aye! I'll try!" Mantus wormed aloud.

The man-creature at the Captain's side circled a creepily attributed head for something missing. "Bloth, where is the Octopian?" Morpho droned a suspicious inquiry.

"I imagine she's getting ready for her brother's, accident, and her succession to the throne." Bloth puffed as if in joke. "She's in for quite the spectacle, on both crowns!" He chuckled gladly, but he did not look behind him and his able eye did not secure upon the princess's head sticking out of the boxes behind him. Unfortunately, Mantus's did.

Jazhea eluded from the crate and pitched for different sectors of the carrier and her goal. "It's not simply Bloth I want revenge on, but a faceless stranger. Someone needs to suffer revenge, and a beloved kinship needs to be avenged." The contemptuous drifter whispered her viced mantra, perhaps now all her dealings with the Men of Power would pay off. He couldn't leave the wheel, she would be fine. For now.

Elsewhere but not far, a trio of trailblazers mingled under an alcove.

"We're looking for our friend, we hoped maybe you had seen him." Tula suggested to the hitchhiker upon their mission.

"I would tell you if I had seen the King of Octopon's son. I only know of Primus's wishes for the Treasures of Rule, after the King's capture I returned the Second Treasure of Rule to Queen Aysha of the Monkeybirds for safekeeping. My adult son, Jargis, became a racketeer on Pandaawa with the deserters of our culture, having nothing to do with anything good. He blamed us for not joining his insurrection against our captors when we were kept as slaves on the foreign nation of Miragon, so he tried to fight us on Pandaawa. You see, I was one of King Primus's Seven Captains, and the King of the dead nation known as Aymara." The plump adviser confided as he was lifted to his webbed feet by strong arms of an empath and a staunch explorer.

"Miragon was a nation? Tell us more, Apsin." Tula consciously warranted more detail from the balding ambassador.

"Oh yes, it was an entire chain once." Apsin blinked after showing his agreement.

"He can tell us more while he's helping us search." Ioz made quick of any trivial matters and jerked the sage-clad escapee and the attached woman away.

"I thought Miragon was a private land." Tula murmured her opinion as she and Ioz assisted Apsin around the bend. She monitored the area that was increasing in activity.

"Of course, Ioz, I'm indebted to you and Tula for breaking me free. I haven't been to Miragon since I was a strapping lad. I'm positive it's abandoned now though." Apsin elaborated. He gandered about as his escorts retained watch, now proximate to the secure rooms on the planking.

"What makes you so sure?" Tula skeptically aimed her perusal on the former king.

"Tula, we'd be wise to check the study, I don't see it being patrolled anymore." Ioz guided his colleague, he temporally flashed her a flick of his facade before swiftly flitting back. In the shadows the cluster remained, waiting out the slow pace of rife watchmen. Tula nodded her accession.

"We were all servants there, I to Milady, Avadasia of Miragon. We did as we were told, but I know of no one of Miragonase descent still alive. They all died out when the revolt of Aymarians seeking vengeance destroyed their home, my son was one of those leading that barrage. They cleverly forced our people to evacuate the archipelago before they attacked. My wife and family, everyone made it off safely but Miragon was completely totaled. In the heat of the moment there was nothing I could have done to the prevent the impetuousness of our people who wouldn't listen to my word. Aymara soon sank of overpopulation upon returning. We defected to a secluded location on Pandaawa, as did I until I was summoned by Ren's father. In recent times we were aware of Jargis's banishment, but I unfortunately made the sour mistake of going to market unprotected." The white-trimmed whiskers of Apsin twitched as he fully retold, trifling his whisper.

"There was someone named Slaggon who lived on Miragon, and he made his living transmuting the resident creatures." Tula offered her purport after. She gawked at the turquoise vortex painted on the supporter's scalp.

"Slaggon? Sorry, does not ring a bell. If anyone did survive, they would have needed to go to the one island that wasn't destroyed. The dangerous island surrounded by an encircling canyon, but living there would mean only having the manifold beasts that inhabited to look up to. Even with the Miragonase's scientific achievements among the upper-crust of it's society, it would be impossible. When Aymara invaded, they shut down their labs and thus all supplies for rescue. One would need a backup to get there in time. Enough about old history, what do you need to know?" Apsin hastily ceased, as if he knew of the charmer's eagerness.

"We have time to talk about this later. First we need to get you and ourselves out of here." Ioz protectively assumed the front. Out from sheets of cloth they scampered after an impression was made in the overflow of surveillance. "I think Bloth must be cutting expenses, I've never seen so much bilge laying around here." He scanned upon the layers of loose articles strewing some compartments, the breeze was barren as he silently murmured. Then the rap was heard, missing Tula but evoking a beaten yell from the caped fugitive.

"Apsin!" Tula outcried. "You brute!" Tula hissed when she punted at the treacherous delinquent, grieving for the recently united on the sodden mat. The fist reached out to ensnare her wrist. While exerting to flee from the duress, Tula found herself pelted sorely in the arm. The man relinquished his hold, but not before being knocked out of his gut by a Tayhojian knuckle. Tula attended to Apsin's racked constitution.

"It wasn't him, it was the sickness. Don't worry about me...here, for you both. I give you my Knowledge Collection, our people were the keepers of such, it will help you down your voyage to beware the Captain who ran and betrayed King Primus's interest only to the strongest side! There are many forms of deceit on the twenty seas, and it is not only the Dark Water Mer needs to fear. Only the Spirit and Beauty of Mer can save us now...this potion will protect you from all evil men with a good conscience. Please, use it well!" The weakened King coughed a latter sentiment and vanished. Ioz pulled Tula up and peeked around the corner. More guards were mobile after the burst of the scuff and blockading the destination. Tula insisted to rue Apsin but she was rapidly dashed from her placement.

"We have to go! Bloth will be on to us if we stick around here!" Ioz scurried Tula down the restricting hall, delaying not after he pocketed Apsin's flask they were passed.

"But Ren...!" The disquieted Tula petitioned for her jilted comrade.

"No way through, we'll just have to hope he's holding up. Let's go!" Ioz charged through the unobstructed way. Tula scattered from her state until another sight caught her eye. She slunk into an invisible nook.

The concise woman scurried to just outside of a balcony. She fiddled with a solo marked key on a ring, which she tried to push into the door foremost of her.

"Oh come on, come on. By Kuunda, hurry up. Please." Jazhea muttered to herself, frustrated as a nervous sweat trickled from her temple. Finally, the door swayed open. She gingerly tiptoed inside the commander's voluminous cabin. Snooping around, she saw obvious room accompaniments. The humanoid who was shackled to a trunk of gold and placed aberrant in the corner stayed silent upon her intrusion. To her disappointment, she did not see anything worth an effort in his berth. She eyeballed the dagron-tailed bird, an aged memorrat fluttered it's wings as it began to squawk and cock it's head at her. It sounded to be fully grown. Fifteen years, at least. Probably older. "I've only been here for two months..." Jazhea muddled, timorous and introspective. "Have to try. Mighty Zuuror?" She whispered a guess at the password the crook had trained to the bird and nothing happened. "Bluelips kreld-slug?" Didn't work, she cursed. She did not know a lot, no personal detail. She tried a few more things she could think of, no answer. "Noy jitat." She breathlessly cursed. "Hmm...Mak Tay?" She carefully edged another guess, she then saw the bird fly out of her visibility.

"Trying to swindle me, Octopian wench?" Jazhea's eyes shocked into tiny specks as she heard the abysmal accusation. She did not turn around in time before an acute dagger ruptured the wall she faced, minuscule fractions away from sealing itself to the white edging of her shoulder. "You'll take your last poogat, woman! If you don't want your destruction multiplied, then you obey my orders and claw the dirt." Jazhea shrieked at the impeccable aim of the commander, she electrified in a spin and saw the shady form had strode to meet her. The mangy silhouette with inky mane had drawn from his side, pierced at her heart.

"Whoa, hold on. I'm not trying to steal from you!" Jazhea screeched out. She embedded herself into the frame near the jarred door, unable to reach to the outside.

"You need to be quarantined or you'll have the jitatan ship sick, empty-minded femme." Mantus culminated his cutting words with an atrocious scowl. He slashed at her trunk but his collecting arm did not move. It blurred. In an instant, the sliverer was compelling her to fall to the floor.

"That's an excuse." Jazhea petrified at the threat of being divided by his ruthlessly sharp shard. In a false display of daring, she blunderingly defended herself with a knife. "Hand me the key to Ren's cell!" She used the opportunity to do what she had come for. Her hands shook, swiftly lamenting her mistake.

"They're overhead, blind Princess of Octopon. Moving is not smart when I can that much faster, unless you Want to eat infected blade." Mantus threatened, he positioned his razor at a rope tying up the ceiling. Jazhea immediately halted. His motion ceased, he uncannily stared at the rather ample gully within the wall. "You'll wish Bloth had Formally tossed your worthless bones overboard when I'm, through with you." He grunted a horrible and intimidating phrase.

"You despicable snake! You're the one responsible for-Wait! No! I really didn't mean anything by that! I didn't betray Bloth! No, I was just kiddingg! You silly jitatan neverian-cake!" Jazhea could not maintain her trembling words with the mean swordsman. He told her it was her misfortune that she had sidestepped becoming gruel in the room's impasse, that she should have been trapped. He became unkindly interested in her ever since.

"You don't have any use for this." The bloodthirsty attacker barked out, he keenly swiped back the key she had stolen. "This is now mine. As a traitor you won't be needing it." Emotionless words rasped as he swiped for the jade pendant underneath Jazhea's throat, eyes of storm flared at her but she protected the Amulet with all she was worth. Unamused, he confiscated any coin she carried with one more rap. She was thrown on her back under his pinning blade.

"Let me go, oh please...we're all buddies right, fellow dagron-riders? We even know the same instructor! I'll even tell you where you can get some gold to take to Bloth! If you let me go!" Jazhea shuddered, her mind flipped and her heart thumped heavy in her chest. Formally. One word he said, but the lone word made her want to be anywhere else from the way it was expelled. This time her lineage would not grant her the appalling honor of being personally extinguished by the Pirate Lord but rather, she would be trashed for boasting too much. This brainy coldheart never conversed, but he loved to brag. This she often overheard. Embezzle from who he called maggots on the ship, at the sink or swim of someone's lifeless hide, or make the same woman a fine prospect of a Trainee-Assistant for those covetous Squadron Cadets. Whatever that meant. He booted her head.

"Where, wench?" Mantus accosted with a detestable grin.

"In the island chain where Ren found the Treasure...it's farther inland, you need to check it out for yourself! There's a chest and everything...in the forest!" Jazhea instantly proposed, she peeked above at the drooping and portending roof to search for anything serpentine. What her laggard eyes would not allow her to see was the winding of a crank that dropped her from the floor underneath into a pit of sharpened dagron-teeth. She yelped as she tried to keep her feet off the painful blades, but it was impossible. The smashing grate collapsed when Mantus kicked it over her only exit.

"I'll keep that in mind when you're groveling to spill your share of every deceitful detail they know about me. Let's see how long you can last as a kabob, Primus's Daughter." Mantus frigidly promised. He dotted a glare to the chest on the opposite confine.

"This is what you do to men that try to steal your gold? I was informed this was in the wall." Jazhea clasped her determined jaw in anguish. She gripped to the bars to lift her weight but she could not fight gravity forever against the torturing skewers that would already be striking were she taller. After the wheel had clicked into place and the seal shut was when she heard the frightened bird had perched on one of the skulls mangled in the bloody spikes. "Let me go...or I'll...find the password! I'll release your bird through the vents and Bloth will hear everything!" She made a desperate plea.

"The threats of a smool-brained girl. It's nothing an eel-blood experiment won't fix if I do keep you, but I wonder how you knew to skip through the claw-lever in here. No wench has tried to steal behind my back before. You'll die when it's time...and perhaps I'll make that skin a little shorter." Mantus was everything entertained as he trotted off to the entrance.

"You lie! You know one did. Let me go." Jazhea coldly sweat when she attempted to balance on the dryrotted remains of other thieves to keep her skin from being pierced. Her eyes flickered an inanimate black once more. Though she could no longer see him, she crawled for his redemption.

"I wonder how you know of her, I'll find out when you're more receptive to questions. Until then, there is no reason to listen to a petty thief who escapes from her quarters. Oh how I'm going to enjoy tearing that pretty belligerence in you to shreds! Now, I have a stand-in to relieve." The commander farewelled with one leg out of the door.

"Because I'm a woman!" Jazhea protested with full despair.

"You act like no woman I've ever met, your treatment is earned." Mantus insidiously sheathed his blade, turning back one final time in slew. Without ado he counted the pieces in the purse and slung it on the plush hide of his mattress. His Captain never displayed vast riches with the same zeal Mantus did, he sunk into the blanketing skin of his posh pad and grinned as he encircled his eyes at the wealth he managed to accumulate. Tiaras and jewels ripped out from tresses of beautiful women decorated the aft. Next to his full set of bonemail were drapes and silks of slain beasts, the skull of a three-headed cretin nailed upon the cupboard. Candles lit up rare obelisks from decimated villages and all of the earnings being a Maelstrom sea-lord, as well as voyages to Janda-town had won him. Crewing for Bloth was indeed good to Mantus, he slumped in a brief moment to admire the trappings of the finest materials and trophies gold could buy. Countless innocents and weak men on the Maelstrom had paid off his lavish lifestyle in their gold or sometimes blood, a fair exchange for a pirate of his status.

"Please...'Mant." Jazhea imitated a luscious voice not of her own, filling in a blank. "You like being called that, right?" She whispered softly in a hopeful gale.

Powder-blue of murderous steel fixed on her in a sour stare. "Squealing dock-rats never last long on this ship, Wench of Primus. Disappearing in Janda-town would be wasted for you. You better hang on for our Sundown, my rotten florascum." The heartless scoundrel admonished with calculating ideas and a hoarse chuckle. The door locked.

"What are you doing, woman?" Ioz turned back as the door shut and Mantus walked away, insisting an immediate response from his peer. Tula stared at the trapped villainess who disappeared from view in the trench, reluctantly following Ioz's lead.

The enshrouded and dusky area on portside of the Maelstrom had been empty except for dual persons cloaked behind barrels.

"No one messes with Z.M.Q.'s legion. Z.M.Q. loves those landlubbin' sea-balletrinas' now...that has become a dangerous task for a wench in port! Aye, 'and with fighting skills he wants them more, makes them graceful I 'spose. He goes a long way to transfer them to his private island from his drop box at 4-1-9 Janda-town." Swaggering to greet another, one babbler spun rumors.

"Z.M.Q. loves minga-melons, this I know!" The Maelstrom pirate lumbering by happily conjoined.

"Ah, nah! He hates 'em! I tell ye he won't eat any food but Puuka-Luuka pie, a reliable matey of mine who gets his grub and salt at the Kalinda bakery knows for real! Z.M.Q.'s as big as 'her Maelstrom is heavy...if ye know what I mean." Lazy oafs began to find their way interested, the tallest bluffed beyond a doubt as he rolled a wasted keg to the board.

"Z.M.Q. is a shape-shifter!" The fazed passerby's tales became even more farfetched.

"Get back to work!" With the snapping whip on the deck the yapping henchman saluted and feared for fate if they were caught shirking again. The beefy shoulders donned their tasks and spied closely for Mantus to pass.

"No he's not, trust me! I saw him standing at the corner tavern, back in Janda-town! I even tested 'him to make sure!" The third neighbor begged to differ, leaning against a prong.

"What do you landlubbers know? No one's ever seen Z.M.Q.! Why in the ka-jin-ga do ye think we keep talking abo-Hey, wait...shouldn't you be in the beast's den! You stole from us!" The two chums immediately flew into a rage, viewing the target of their wrath alive and well. The mugger began to stutter as the bruisers advanced to slay.

"Wait, brother! Look at his arm, he belongs to Z.M.Q.!" The second crony trembled, jumping over himself as the loudmouth attempted to justify the mark. "Ye know, Z.M.Q. marks all his subjects in their sleep...maybe we should just get out of here and not tell Bloth about this...just ignore us slackers dribbling pirate's tales instead of doing our work...if Mantus comes back tell him we needed to umm...fetch a runaway dagron." The two aggressors carefully backed away at the daunting reveal and then took off for far away. Disheartened, the Z.M.Q. recruit plodded off Westward.

"Ren isn't here." The shady-maned ecomancer screened behind the cylinder began. "I think he must have got himself into trouble. We need to go look for him. I sense danger." With much worry, her inflection changed to persuade but Ioz was much too preoccupied with watching two of Bloth's men mince swords in an illy unhurried practice session. "Ioz?" Panic had nearly scrabbled way into her words.

"Steady, Tula. We'll find him. We just need to sneak our way out of here without those bilge-brained sea-mules noticing." Ioz soundly whispered. His eyes spied and attended to the group of brawny-built but simple-minded cronies patrolling the gated part of the heavy vehicle. "I have a plan, back me up." The blazing daredevil uprooted from his crouching stance and confronted the two ugly-faced hooligans who trumped over the outer-central walkway. "Excuse me, my good fellows, but do you happen to know where I can shine my sword?" He quizzed, approaching with his blade pointed to the sky. The goons crisply backed away in the opposite direction, addled but also wielding weapons. "No? Oh well, I'll just have to use you then." Ioz filled the pause as he swiftly swung at the knaves and succeeded to smack both of them over the skeleton of the rail and into the water.

Tula tiptoed out from the shade of the barrel she had stooped by. "Nice going, Ioz, you almost got us caught!" The brazen-eyed woman lectured her teammate as she stood to his side, deriding above a whisper.

"If it works for a thief, it works for a pirate." The pirate lackadaisically stated. Twirling around the thief's finger was a brigmaster's key he had instantaneously swiped. "Now we find Ren." Ioz made haste ahead and the two deckmates zipped away in pursuit of the lost crew.

Mantus returned to his ward with little more than weak agitation. The heavens were shading when charlatans of different angles exchanged stances. No sooner did the administrative thief begin directing the company than he was bumped by a illy-comprised blob.

"I must find my map!" Morpho stampeded into the evil commander in a wreck of mania.

"Get a new map, rotten slug!" With revulsion Mantus punted the interrupter with a knee to excuse himself. Morpho was moiling into his personal space and festering with an indescribable odor.

"It's marked with future routes, it can't be replaced if everything is to go according to plan with my Master! He needs it for Bloth's strategic use!" Morpho boiled after repeatedly shaking the object of his quandary. Waves swashed over the base of the yanking hull.

"Well tell him to save it for the future!" The commander protested again, clipping himself free of the frenetic retention. He grasped the bone spool, committed to clambering yonder.

"Mantus, are you taking us en route to the Wraith? I don't remember this mineral formation as part of our route!" Bloth's crisp inquest vaulted with a jolt to the nerves. The Captain was observing the vicinity before he was swerved away to the ranks of his myriad.

"Where is the map?! Now!" Mantus racked the third-mate for answer. Strand instinctively shrugged twice. The second-in-command scoured around at the unfamiliar environment in the midst of the tossing mistral, his eyes flashed upon a reminiscence of the abysmal Maalagar falls. Then he remembered Phorlock taught all his students the same way. "Don't steer near that rock! Noy jitat!" He speedily hurdled from his station.

The walkways deep in the colossal water-palace grew ever silent as more topmen were required above to deal with the brewing storm. The loyal pair of crewmates probed for the cell in the brig where they witnessed their captured friend being whisked off to.

"I swear by the sword I saw him go down here, woman!" Ioz beckoned with a whisper as he trailed Tula through a tunnel completely absent of guards.

"I don't sense anything this way!" The ecomancer protested, designating to follow her own cognizance. The two had funneled to the end of the corridor before the man realized she was correct in her assumption.

"We'll go back!" Ioz acceded now as Tula led the rebounding way out. "It's fortunate Ren bought us some cindersand, otherwise I couldn't see my sword in front of a midnight-monsoon." He commented as he hoisted a dim torch he had used makeshift from topside. "We don't know where he could be keeping Ren." He reminded with a weary visage, the sorceress with him did not whirl backward in time to see his stunt before he carried it out.

The hatch bearing a scorpion ensemble opened and quickly shut again as Tula rushed back to help Ioz snap it closed. The sizable scorpion strayed around the walls, trying to score the new prey. "Ioz, why would you open a door with a giant scorpion on the front?" Tula almost slapped him in the head when she rattled out the phrase of provocation.

"I thought it might be a clever ruse." The abash Ioz nonchalantly justified himself. "Come on, you shardfish!" He recklessly provoked the baleful crustacean and batted his sharp edge.

"Sure you did! Come on!" Tula roared bitingly and grasped him away as he splatted the arachnid against the stony wall.

Shiftily, the comrades trotted the pathway through the long hall. Tula had been about to pull her shipmate into a curve when a figure ambushed her from out of the gloom. "Tula!" Ioz diligently drew his sword and slashed at the offending tramp, who repressed his attack with a blunt cutlass.

"Sorry kreld-eaters, no chance in the twenty seas!" The conducting unit of Bloth's force heckled as Ioz powerfully swerved a slicer, which the scamp blocked. Tula kicked from the corner and achieved a victory as the enemy lost his balance. One more strike from Ioz crippled him to the floor.

"Thanks for the help!" Ioz sincerely praised, he grabbed Tula's arm and rapidly flew off as she ran in front of him.

"Ay chunga, you're welcome!" Tula shouted to her older seadog, skipping forward at a plentiful speed. She shuttered her gaze one last time to the hindered jailer and continued onward.

"Hey, what are you doing?!" The previous watchman wielded a clipping switch-dagger, stirring at the noises from the intruders. The Z.M.Q. marking on his shoulder extended with his unruly fist.

No!" Ioz fret at the intimidating scar immediately and his lids winced. He jerked the slug-can in an impulsive objective to rid he and Tula of the expelled vagrant and the insoluble worm slipped into a narrow well to the bilge. He punched the threat's lights out, delaying not even a ticking beat.

Within a room among a level by the helm, a frightened woman could only fret to find a convincing cry for mercy on the terrorizing bandit's return.

The contrite captive didn't know how long it would be before she was arrested and interrogated or killed but the muscles of her arms were shivering. When she lost her hold she would sink that short distance, then a slow agony would drain her spirit before she withered away. Live like a Bloth pirate, Die like a Bloth pirate. Only, at an accelerated rate like the poor men below her, still donning their puffy hats and stained armor. They probably thought they would see another sun. No wonder no one questioned Mantus's orders. Who told Bloth I was Princess Jazhea of Octopon? Oh, that's right, me, and my jitatan hubris. If she left her protection, her eyes would fail on her in the middle of the ocean. She broke into sobs at this impossible misfortune. Die horrifically alone, or chance her luck here. She peeked upon the resting bird with seeing eyes. The door flung open. It all fell to the depths of the ocean.

"I'll do whatever you want me to, anything! At all! Take all my gold! Just not thumbbites! I'd rather go to Janda-town, I'd even rather be thrown to the Constrictus! No I mean, I don't want to be thrown, but if I'll be Eel-possessed than I'd rather! Please, by the two moons have mercy, no-o!" Jazhea panicked, unable to stop wailing as she begged in vain.

"Quiet your scummy throat, wench! The final and pleasant moments you have before your brother's death will not last long." The cold bladesman spit, soon followed with a frightening leer. "By Toishuok, I Will I let Eels swallow your decaying pelt. Now I know that map was in your possession and this is your last chance to tell me what you did with it." Mantus belted concealed wrath, he sluggishly cleaved his blade toward the ceiling and Jazhea froze. He anxiously searched out the doorway for any trace of incriminating activity.

Jazhea would never get out of this, she would be at fault for her brother's death and her own. Somehow, the Constrictus would be one of her...starting assignments entailed under his charge. Starting. Kuunda, have mercy. Jazhea peered toward the only hope she would have, the bird. Something not easily forgotten or something with meaning to him she did not know, but too much depended on not trying. She sweat, the idea struck. "Why don't you find your own way out of Maalagar because I don't have your map anymore...To honor?" Remembering, Jazhea slowly let the phrase roll in silence.

"Don't even try. Your break-in will be nothing of suffering once I escort you out, useless Princess, that morning crow of yours needs some trimming I'm going to enjoy. Under my patrol you would be in-Aaaarrgh!" The foul commander began to smartly ramble something, but soon fell silent and then into a blinding rage when the otherwise-motionless fixture in his room came to life.

"Commander Mantus of the Maelstrom, Operation Sibling-Rivalry-Sting. Day Forty-two: Bloated Blue-Lips is a kreld-eating smool-brain." The memorrat flew over to Jazhea repeating in above a perfect and crystal-clear repetition of the commander's voice. "Noy jitat. By Kuunda, again my qualities are better that half-masted toad who can't keep this floater in line. Letting this larva unkept is an incompetent plan no better than the things those absurd smilge-worms do on leave. If Konk brings soakingscoo, it's buoy. Curse his Brainless Lard, Phorlock knows the Seal belonged to M-" The bird glided about as it growled out many of Mantus's filthy one-lined commentaries meant to unflatter his boss, or his boastful rants and conceited qualifications to be captain.

Jazhea smiled. "You are just what I need, my friend." Jazhea excitedly relieved a sigh, plucking up the bird with one arm to pocket it in a sack she brought with her. "By the Toi of Quin, you gave me a reminder! Thank Kuunda, you were careless with Common!" She luckily delighted.

"Mak toi! Oh, he will benefit with a darva-worm in his gut...Someday. If I owned this ship, I would..." The memorrat felicitously gnarled on.

"I'll jump down to these cutting stakes and release your friend into the vents of Bloth's quarters with a happy note. My suffering for drabbling hearsay of chronological events, or your life. Make your choice, leech-nosed brute. I always carry a scroll and ink. Always." Jazhea's confidence raised, her threatening dealings resumed.

"Clever bargaining, Primus's Daughter. I'll give you this round." Mantus furiously kicked the imprisoning hatch open and pulled the dame up by her high collar, but it was evident he was suppressing his venom. His arms were crossed under flowing sleeves. Only hereditary athletics allowed the princess to swing over as fast as she did, but she was weakened. She backed up.

"Now you're slug-burying filth here, who needs to do as you're told!" Jazhea clumsily tugged at the insectoid's cutlass-hilt she could not lift as Mantus stared noxious poison into her cheap bluff. "Why did Say the Sibyl believe you had stolen my Amulet of Devotion? Bloth's Assassin became Constrictus-bait after Captain Mizar fled from his brig, I know a witness but somehow you are the pirate I was warned about." She further tried to exploit the scenario to her advantage. She brought out the avian from her bag, promising to let it go as it carried on in repeat ramblings of any shameful dribble he had recently dumped into it. By some miracle of Kuunda's blessing and perhaps a stroke of luck, he let her move today. She back-peddled slowly, lashing her knife as she asserted herself out.

"I'll bet a runaway pirate told you that." Mantus calmly assumed.

"Ye-s, actually. Give me the key to brother's cell or Bloth gets an earful of bilge-mouth, Guuda!" Jazhea blinked at Mantus, her volume tripped and was almost loud enough to alarm. She stumbled, now too late.

The commander throated a grunt, still snarling. "Sly wench, but I don't carry the key. Only Bloth does now, and your plan is flawed, Primus's Daughter. Mak Toi!" Mantus cruelly let out a gruff laugh as he met a razing grin with the would-be-cunning bother. He swung with invisible speed at her again with the piercing weapon, but instead of hitting, corralled her aside to a corner.

Jazhea scampered to gather her bearings to the outside when Mantus tried to slam her escape before she could break with the pet. "To honor!" She critically yelled to the bird, halfway out and pressed by the door frame. She forcibly let the memorrat go to flee, it tamely flew in and about the room. "Noy jitat! I don't have a chance!" Jazhea cursed, disgruntled as she reversed and bolted. Mantus immediately crushed the door shut before the bird could fly. She took off toward the bow. To her terror, the ship had come to a rest. Over the spiked rails of bone she saw a crimson vessel in the near distance, which seemed to be trying to scatter away. "Ren's ship!" She murmured under soft air. Mantus started to return to the deck with blade still drawn, she hastily ducked away. Out of an enclosed nook of burlap, she tacitly extracted a map with her fingertips. In the shadows, she saw holes swallow her vision again.

Under cloudy skies and uncontrollable winds, a ruby flutter of feathers flurried amidst a modest schooner. The hybrid attempted to multitask.

"I don't see Ren up there!" Niddler pessimistically squawked, in a panic. He had been aiming eyes at the gigantic ship which drifted only a brief distance away for any sign of the leader. The Wraith had not refrained from heaving and hauling to the will of the choppy waves and violent winds. It's scout was almost lost in sink. He struggled to preserve his monkeybird hands upon the spindles of the helm to drive the lesser craft away from the monstrous destroyer. He failed a great deal. Monkeybirds were not created to steer ships in storms, especially when solo. He flew up to the rope, resolute to adjust the sail with his beak to catch the windburst, but his wings gave out on his best intentions and he plummeted to the deck below. Too many times Niddler had needed to use the Treasure to repel the black water threatening to attack the waiting skiff and his flight muscles were fatigued. The minga-melon rind carrying the Treasure of Rule wobbled on the flat, he was burdened to slide and catch it. He imagined he heard something being tucked from the cabin. Twisting his head, he glared at nothing. He gripped the melon husk and pad for the hold to hide. He gave up on trying to escape from the cloaking Maelstrom.

Over the dismal floorboards on the green deck of the Maelstrom, the infamous Captain stood by his legion. The voices echoed as the pirates attentively listened to orders.

"Bloth! Someone has stolen the map!" Morpho reported with a grisly importance.

"Sir! I uhhh...know not to interrupt Bloth now so umm, I finished that rolecall you assigned me to do two moons ago...well I looked at it and decided there were some rules that needed a better run-through." The scuttling ignoramus broached with a jittering report.

"Then what did it say? Do tell." Mantus wrinkled his nose at the abash regret scorched on his laborer's folly.

The current brigmaster summarized a scroll but nothing was written on it, and the assignment he had completed was a distant dream. "...All deckhands above midshipman please report to station...Rinky Dinky Lemon Pinky...for further instructions and please line up to enjoy a complimentary mug of grog." The brigmaster swallowed as he tried to dictate from the back reaches of his struggling brain. Nervous sweat poured and Mantus merely stared at him through insectoid lids.

"Many men would kill to wear your hat." Mantus pointed at his brigmaster's cap, raising one deadly orb of blue up to overcome the awkward silence. The pitiful prankster gulped and clenched his throat.

"Ioz and Tula must be here, search the ship! The Treasure is on the Wraith, we'll track them and re-chart our course." Bloth gave the insidious instruction as he almost rejoiced in the smugness of his legwork becoming that much simpler.

"Yes, Milord." Mantus affirmatively fell in line.

"Konk! Take the scout-ship and search every dark and filthy corner of the Wraith for the Treasure! Leave no stone unturned! Don't come back until you find it!" The Pirate Lord roared at a short-man with a pegleg who obliged with a fearful nod and a gulp. "Keep 'Her steady, Mantus." He issued to his obedient second-in-command who bowed and resumed position. Bloth's warriors gathered around as they awaited further instruction. "Now to give our prince the time of his short life. Don't worry your miserable neck, my lad, I will give your friends a warm welcome before they even think of freeing you." Bloth tapered off with a growl as he lifted up his unblunted and powerful blade, showing one instant's heed to Ren's discomforted ruffling in chains below the overhead bars he stood atop. He and his crowd of mean-spirited buccaneers stormed for the brig.

The silence falling over the mucid chamber of the prisonhold had been broken by one of the prisoners who caused a clink-clank of metal.

Ren resisted in the shackles binding his hands, trying to find a way out of the sooty and dripping cell that locked him in. "Noy jitat." He uttered under his thwarted breath. He sadly examined his surroundings once more. He could see no way out through the floor or the walls and the space between the bars was too tight for him to slip through. He tried to wrest some part of him past in the hope of finding a means to the outside, if only for the principle of not going down without a fight. Echoes and noises blared through the dank hallway of the brig and he bent his head to look and listen.

"Ren!" Tula shouted to her incarcerated deckhand as she and Ioz bounded forward with straining breaths. She ensnared a glimpse of him in the lurid asylum of the long hallway.

"Tula!" Ren greeted the receptive woman with glad eyes. He was trying to reach through the bars.

"Good thing Bloth was careless with his guards." Ioz swatted an eye to Ren in acknowledgment as he clutched his knees and panted from running. "We wouldn't have made it if we had to take out another one of those moronic bilge-leeches." The convivial pirate quickly related, outwardly dehydrated from having to run so furiously. Ren persisted to fight his wrists against the shackles. Tula latched to the bars before him, plying in vain to pull out.

"I don't have my weapon. Bloth has the key and he's coming back!" Ren cried out perilously, despondently succumbing to his fate. "You need to go, save yourselves!" He yelled tryingly, warning as he transposed in the beeline of a mayhem heard down the hall.

"No Ren, we're getting you out!" Tula insisted, obstinate but notably flustered. When her eyes wandered to the ground, an idea jostled her. "Ioz, gather some dust! I think I can pick the lock ecomantically!" She briskly signaled to the older crew to help her.

"Scot pango, I can try!" Ioz replied, promptly using his palms to collect the dirt and sediment left on the cold and clammy floor. Tula knelt with the seafarer next to her and hoarded the soot in a scant pile. Ren gathered what he could of the grime through the bars.

"I think I have enough!" Tula blared as she began to centralize her energy. She tautly focused, persuading the silt to flux and accumulate. It conducted to merge into one solid object. It floated up, forcing into the lock. She felt her energy depleting. Just a little more would do.

"Hurry up, woman!" The brash comrade next to Tula urged to expedite. Noises were becoming louder from down the passageway, Tula heard them amplified in her ears as her concentration drained.

"I'll get him out, I just need a little more!" Tula's stress constricted, the dirt flushed deeper in.

"Not if we get captured!" Ioz critically warned, rapping his head around in troublesome rile. The shale pushed through the lock and began to turn as the artful prince behind the door readied himself to spring, a nervous sweat slipped from his forehead. The wayward sword extracted to point straight at the swart-haired swashbuckler's throat.

"No!" Tula cried out, defeated and stricken. She flashed her eyes open as she watched the amassment of filth drop to the floor. Two calloused hands instantly collared her arms. Her heart pounded before she battled but her force fizzled, being unfit to defend properly. The captured prince shot contempt through his eyes, tightly grappling the bars. Ren's face became an anxious expression of powerless fury.

"Well, it looks like good fortune has found me today! I not only have the prince in my possession but his estranged crew with him." Bloth vivaciously mocked from a bantam sea of men at the captives before him. "Take them to the hold!" The captious orge demanded as the swabs carted off the wearied and agonizing Ioz and Tula. The door to the cell of the imprisoned Ren opened and he thrashed his weight at the outlaws and struggled, kicking out, but he had been restrained by his arms and forced forward.

"Noy jitat! You'll suffer for this, you kreld-eater!" Ioz growled with exasperated wind at the wicked Pirate Lord, but Bloth ignored him. He wrestled fiercely to feud the wall of the vicious knaves, uprising in a last attempt to free himself. The crew was being led out of the walkway of the brig and to the ultimate level above.

The hold like a closet in the humble vessel lay still, concealed in shadows as it slowly filled with sounds. Many barrels and storage compartments were tossed aside and underfoot as a handful of crewmen slogged through the quiet storeroom.

"Find Treasure!" The looter with a pig face in the ship's hold instructed to a bunch of block-headed pirates at his beck and call.

"It's not upstairs, Konk, we looked. What if it's not here?" The slow man reverberated inside the room, he likely lacked more intelligence than the runt who bossed him.

"We search jitata ship for it! It be here." Konk speculated and waddled over to rummage a nearby barrel, which visibly dipped inside when he moved close. He had bad eyesight in dark however, and did not notice. He growled. The piglet reached his hand inside and pulled out a minga-melon peel, he gave it a once-over and angrily threw it back in.

"No! Ren's ship!" The cease of a flimsy maiden wailed from out of the thin hammock as she stood in the drudge's tracks.

"Stupid girls, stay out of Konk way!" With an uncouth grunt Konk bunged his adjustable leg. He plucked a gadget from his belt and then the knife stuck inside the timber as a warning, but gouged the palm on the younger of the duo. Lus-nayi relieved Joiquiva with clotting the wound, elbows curled defensively into their knees. Their purpose was to stay out of way of the dangerous workings of the crew and though they once were asleep in bed, both twins wept of sorrow and fear. Lus-nayi tiptoed topside to make a break for the medicinal herbs.

"Why can't we go back to ship now?" The taller but just-as-ignorant rascal in the room complained.

"Idiots! We don't go back until we find Treasure!" The midget hobbled off to the other men in a rant. He did not want to be responsible for not following through with orders again.

"What if Ren has it?" Another pirate whined.

"If boy has it then Bloth find it anyway!" Konk erupted in a harsh chuckle as he kicked down another drum with his pegged-leg. The lackey had spoken of the very thing the Gantha-pig worried about, but he intended to stay here until he accomplished his duty. He bat an eye at the one keg in the corner. "We go look up-deck now!" Konk ordered, tottering up the stoop with a bundle of Bloth's moronic goons. "Sneaky boy hide Treasure well..." He droned off one last time as he slammed the door to the storage room behind him.

Niddler drew in a relieved sigh, he clutched the melon rind with his mitts from the barrel in the corner. He felt the boat rocking amid the water as if it were going somewhere, but he continued to stow away.

"No barnacle-weed, do you sew like this all the time, girl?" Lus-nayi was breathless in a flash of contrite incompetence. Even though she had treated her vigilant sibling and let her to sleep she was caught in the very middle of repairing the Wraith's jib, as she always did in secret. The canvas she had sewn rippled but nothing would tear it.

"I wonder how Mantus will reward me when I bring him one of these, I hate scraping rudder-salt every Septomoon. Promotion time for Krag is certainly in order!" Krag grinned with a naughty fleer as he abducted Lus-nayi into a cage wide enough to fit her and locked her inside. The scarlet-clad twin hysterically trounced her thin shape against the bars and pathetically clawed for a way out. "I wonder what he'll call you, bug-face, maybe Bouncy. Aye, Bouncy's a good name. I'll leave you signed on his doorstep, eheehe!" The golden-haired pirate with the top-knot was quite the buisnessman, even so as he toppled a fighting Joiquiva to unconsciousness and effectively obstructed her from rescuing her beloved kin.

Behind a stack of barrels on another deck, rain started to visibly pour down. The braided lass stayed hidden behind the cylinders before she dashed. She halted immediately.

"The Treasure is still on the Wraith and within reach." The deformity recited with accuracy. "The dark water told me!" Morpho slurped as he licked his tentacle with a slobbery drool.

"Excellent, then we may begin." Bloth sanctioned the next exploit with anticipation. He turned to a subject quelled in his duress. "Ah, it's been ages. You're still as enticing as ever, Tula. My offer is still open, I'm in need of Ren's sweet ecomancer to further my purposes. I would hate to have to keep you prisoner or to have you sleep like last time." Pasty fingers trembled over the ecomancer's cheek, the fiend triumphantly amused himself.

"Don't touch me!" Tula sizzled and sent out a boot of steel, but she wasn't able to fight well enough. Her scared guise resumed as the glacial one grinned at her.

"Let her go!" Ren screamed from his inefficient station. "You want the Treasure, Bloth, well take it up with me! Leave Tula out of this! Unless you think your crew can fight a monster far more deadly than any Constrictus." He failed to subdue rage at the overbearing archenemy. It didn't stop the dribbling mouth of wan from raiding the side of the conquest's ear.

"Monster more deadly than the Constrictus? Tell me, and I'll think about it." Bloth was ever entertained, but found far more interest in toying with Tula's silky locks.

"On the Maelstrom there is a slug loose, forged by dark water! When we were in Pandaawa they ravaged Monkeybird-City, leaving no scrap of life! We tried to use the Treasure of Rule but it just wouldn't work! I know that slug is here now and it will eat your hull out from the inside unless you let us go!" Ren fancied a savvy scheme in a thought, his quick eyes darted to Ioz expectantly to finish the deal. Fear shuddered from Mantus's spine at the sightings of dark water.

"These slugs were made of dark water and yet they did not die to the Treasure...unless you can explain to me why, boy, this information is useless to me. Why should I keep you alive. I think I'd rather see if you will die to the Constrictus while I claim from you those Treasures you speak of." Bloth spent an interval on Ren's advisory like nothing, he assumed an urge to kill. Tula moaned like grief and dejection.

"Don't drag it everywhere under the Merrian-Sun, Ioz!" Tula squirmed to no avail in the Captain's restraint but her limbs did very little, her infirmity set on her rescue-partner for abandoning their secret-weapon too soon.

"But it was Z.M.Q. we were dealing with, Tula!" Ioz justified himself in loosing the slug to the marred slave of a fear-plague. He suppressed a forsaken temper at Bloth, who was now playing the coy-gentleman.

"Sure, it was!" Tula sighed as her strength departed.

"This darva-skinning son of a sea-mule will never get away with this, set me loose and we'll fight man-to-man!" Ioz riotously roared, disabled and infuriated as he wrenched from every angle in aspiration to twist himself asunder. The wicked sealord at last set the contained Tula down of his own will.

Jazhea spotted her aim as she veered around behind her person to break for the Constrictus den. She threw a red slug on the ground, preparing to stomp it underfoot but hesitantly tapped backward. She saw the Captain and several men with him emerging with what arrived to be four captives. The faction laughed and throughly enjoyed themselves on the way up. The villain's eye glanced at her, he traipsed for the junction in the middle of the ship. He pressed the likeness she had been seeking in his arm. Raiders behind him followed carrying his dearest friends, all stopped only a length away from the monster pit. Mantus trembled evermore as Bloth picked him out from the side, a yowl followed.

"As for you, Mantus, I should punish you for loosing the map to that eyeless runt. I didn't know my commander's skill was so inadequate compared to so many other fine men..." The Captain brutishly teased the second-in-command as he clipped him up by the shoulder. Bloth had toyed with the idea of making Strand his new commander, although Vlor would have been a good second-choice.

"It will never happen again! She stole my key, Milord! I did not want to steer us onto the wrong course, I was avoiding the Maalagar current!" Mantus groveled under Bloth's powerful fist. He flinched as he listened to the squeals of the Constrictus pit directly beneath him. Strand snickered with felicity at the subject of a promotion. The third-mate was sure he'd be up for the extra pay, even if skipping a rank meant for more pressure. All he did was tell a little tattle. Scorpionrats were known for their dishonesty after all.

"How many times have you mutinied against me, Mantus? Tell me." Bloth rung Mantus, at the limit of his patience.

"Twice!" Mantus sunk his globular lids with an almost feminine squeak from his sagging lips. Bloth dipped him lower. Mantus squinted on the painful breath of air that would be his last.

"My commander didn't know where he was going?" Bloth sounded bemused but genuine. "Perhaps next time I'll let you swim up to your neck in bilge with the other sea-lepers, provided you can escape from the only eyeless friend you need to worry about." Mantus scrunched his eyes when he felt himself ready to drop, but Bloth instead lobbed him aside. Evidently, the vile one was too joyous from this new plan that for once, he showed a cruel act of kindness. "The Maalagar falls should swallow your carcass but because the boy's crew is with me by consequence, your life is spared! Now steer us off-course from this downpour!" He directed the servant and turned back to his purpose.

"Yes, Lord Bloth!" Mantus saluted when his gangling form weaseled up from hands and knees, squirming but sneering umbrage after having narrowly escaped a permanent signing of his resignation. Other oodles of men persisted to laugh themselves sick at the spurned commander.

"Bloth." The princess addressed him simply, yet with tremendous disgust.

"Ahh...you're just in time to see your rise to the throne." The ugly and indomitable brute gleamed at her and jested. "I do rather enjoy sibling rivalry." He considered the travesty and confined Ren in his arm by the back of the collar. Bloth wielded his sword over Ren's throat, in one strike the young man could be gone.

The boy's eyes were attentive to the sister of his with bafflement, but Ren greatly regarded and gawked in fear at the terrorizing enemy before him. The two prisoners restricted by swindlers stared death at the shady dame. "Ren is my brother. We made an agreement I wouldn't have to stay here, and you would keep him as a prisoner so I could become Queen if I brought you the Treasure. Killing him wasn't part of the bargain!" Jazhea alleged, her words were livid. Ren's spacious eyes flickered and dashed to her.

"She betrayed us, Ren!" Tula yelled to him from where she was glommed back, but she became instantly silenced. Ioz endured to the direct side of the enchantress and glared with clenched teeth.

Ren was stunned as he flashed over to her. That's what this was all about? She wanted to take his eventual place on the throne. Something inside him didn't believe it, but it was true, apparently. He racked to swing himself loose. His enemy grasped him much too strongly.

Bloth rolled a curious gander at her. "Really? Well now, that's too bad, darling. My agreement was that you would learn what this boy knows and convey that information as well as the Treasure if you wished to go at will. Failure is the end, and mine is the only you need worry about. Your plight is my gain, not that you were compliant at all." The icy giant proceeded as if she had divulged nothing. He inclined his sickening gaze to Ren and raised his blade. "Farewell, prince of fools." He jeered and scoffed at the competitor he would end. Jazhea sprinted in an attempt to stop him but before she could catch him, something else had. Water on the deck had merged into a bubble of boiling heat and hit the hostile captain on the hand where he suspended his victim. Though Ren's hands were still shackled, he nimbly careened and punted the bloated malefactor square in the stomach, which allowed a fall to the deck. The dexterous prince landed on his back. Behind the recoiling tyrant, Tula fell weak and about to collapse to her knees as the guards inflexibly squelched her.

Jazhea rushed to her brother's side but Ren could only muster a peek of distrust. The siblings snapped in a gawk as a low hum approached and a nasty form stalked to rest beside the evil Pirate Lord. "Do it now, Bloth." Morpho signaled a slick authorization, contriving to the gigantic and bleached behemoth who began to arise while cradling a burned hand. Bloth produced a baneful sound and his lips twisted into a scandalizing sneer.

"Since you asked so nicely, Ren...You!" The Pirate Lord promptly spun about to pick up the ecomancer who had attacked him and without allowing anyone time to react, cast her into the foul-smelling pit to the back of him.

Tula, the only victim with both her wrists and ankles manacled, plunged into Constrictus pen. Her energy had been spent and as the enfeebled woman sunk, she could only gaze fearfully above at the heartless soul who ditched her.

The disarrayed heir lashed his head at the pit, instantly recognizing the severity of the situation. "Tula! No!" Ren acutely wrought after her. With no time to think of any stratagem and with arms still fettered, he willed himself off his feet and dove unrestrained into the tunnel below. No one had enabled or stood to obstruct his path. On the way in, he scantly caught a glimpse of the glowering stare of his blackhearted rival. He returned the most dreadful glare.

"Ren! Tula!" Ioz hollered out in a prohibited rage, neighboring on breaking his mind. "You jitatan..." He seethed through his strangulated breath. He engaged to bash himself some leeway, but he did not reserve nearly enough strength to fight his way through the unusually insurmountable gang caging him. He assaulted with intent to demolish, and became suppressed to his back.

"Ren!" Jazhea sorrowed, her heart racing. She scattered for the entrance but became knocked back by the resentful and hostile pirates who now enjoyed the permission to hit her. She instantaneously retreated, and she felt something grapple her ankle. She kicked with all her existence but only found herself slopped in the roughest suburbs of the kravidorm, too overwhelmed by the provoked looters.

The screeching exploded from beneath as the Constrictus yet again awoke. The raven-locked ecomancer remained as still as obtainable. She envisioned wiggling herself out and circumventing through a hole, which could promise a path to the sewer like the one used the last time she had been here. She could not ignore the second big splash in the pit, Ren splattered to the border of her ground. Ay jitata. She was shaking, the worst thing ever able to happen proceeded to happen. "Ren! No!" Tula wailed before she could perform anything.

Ren had fallen from the way down, he was only becoming capable on his feet. Too late. He witnessed the last and most frightening sight he would ever see.

"Noo!" Tula quaked with a terrified scream, she watched powerlessly as her earnest friend disappeared. The barbaric titan noticed her now and continued to slink toward her, only resting to make the most anomalous of sounds.

The screams echoed from nether, the detestable captain heard music to his ears. "It sounds like Ren is out of my way at last! My most formidable enemy has at last been defeated!" Bloth laughed for an enduring stretch before he talked of his exaltation. He clutched the spiral-sculpted Treasure in his solid fist. "Now nothing will stand in my way from taking this world as mine. Excellent plan, Morpho. I may just make you my new commander." He smiled a conniving grin at the distracted Mantus who deafly pretended to be absorbed in his own work. "These two are nothing, at all!" The egotist flouted coldly and he revolved to look at the two clinging opposers in his vicinity, both of which were ragged and mercilessly beaten down to no salvation.

"Wait, Bloth." Morpho advocated with a disgruntled rasp to the horrid overlord parallel to him. The slate-bearded face changed to one of disorientation, the captain's scrutiny fell on the pit below.

"Dartha-eel..." Ioz darkly hissed as he tried to pry himself up and off the ground. "Your life won't be long enough to swallow your own sword." He strained in speech, his ire wrathful and unforgiving. The brimming henchmen left him alone, rejecting what no longer posed any threat.

Down in the void of dolor, slime surrounded it all. He could feel nothing but horrible and unrestrained pains. No pass through the sticky grub. The strange sensation pulsated, he continued to hear her voice. He would crawl his way through, she still abode out there. Ren did not have his weapon but he would force his avenue out, through the way he accessed. It stopped moving, he could feel it motionless. His movements must have been damaging, but he did not think about that now. He saw it getting lighter still.

Tula remained stationary in the crook of the pit. She did not speed for the byway because she believed her act would cause the thing to rummage for her, but it had slowed to a drag as it came near. It did not even conspicuously want to move, she was upset and distraught. It arrested then completely, and that was when she saw it glow, something in there. It developed to be his embodiment. That was when she remembered. He kindled an eerie light of emerald, like water waves. Though he had collapsed, he floated in the lake as though he slumbered. Ren's beryl eyes opened and the basin commenced to flourish of the same vivid aura of malachite, illuminating as if purifying. His mind drew correlation to the flow in the River he swallowed when inheriting the 9th Treasure. He wasn't hurt at all. She reached his form to earn a better vantage, and he arched toward her and beamed. She clasped him tight in a hug, not able to comfort herself. Ren and Tula communicated wordlessly, sitting and scoping the crystallized beast in the pristine over it's extinction. Only after this event played out did the questmates realize the disaster of the baited mire, which they now were stuck neckdeep in. The twinkling duo spied up the towering shaft of the exitway to the Constrictus pit. Though it had been arduous to see, Ren could annex the face of his enemy. One yellow eye stabbed in shattering horror, seeing the kept and vicious monster as nomore at the bottom of his ship. Then it twisted only to show an insatiable and ruthless anger, such would consume a leviathan with trepidation.


	11. Chapter 10

Chapter 10

The water of the previously squalid chamber shone a brilliant green, the aurora cast against the walls like morning light over waves. The light-haired regal at the base of the pit embraced the no-longer grimed or inhibited woman. The two young heroes bravely gaped up at the scene and the captain above them. Everything was still and effectively halted. That was when it erupted into a blaze like never seen before. Pirates began pouring down the Constrictus pit. Some hit the water and were charging right for them.

"Tula, we'll make for the tunnels! I think I know a way out." Ren hastened to maintain the enchantress with a stable arm around her waist. The two raced into the deep canal, vicious and dirty men following in footsteps. It seemed the pilferers were not effected by the colorful light that now proceeded to fade behind them. Waddling through bilge and residue, the shipmates essentially tripped. Loud shouts and growls were echoing in the passageway that promised to lead to the doorway of muck, through the mouth of the bleached leviathan.

On a dismal plane just above the musty and busy pit, the giant warlord leaned over the square hatch in the belly of the doldrums. His screams flung across the waterlogged deck in a way so demonic and maniacal, it would not have been recognizable.

"By the blood of the two moons! Go after him now! I will make him pay myself! That rotten!-Puny boy will suffer a life of a thousand nightmares at my hands!" Bloth raged and beat his fists like an animal, he was swinging his sword rashly in the air as if he were insane. His bulky arms were trembling and quaking with an unabated and wrathful fury which consumed him in totality. His vision tunneled downward, only at the chasm he rooted over.

"Patience, Bloth. We will hunt him down to the end of the seas, now that we know what he is capable of." The rancid creature, Morpho, hissed into the rain as he stagnated next to the bloodlusting Pirate Lord. Dark water visibly started to churn in the waves outside of the stronghold.

Ioz stabilized himself on the coarseness of the wet planks. He could not see or know what had been going on. He felt rickety, he ogled at the mobs of buccaneers diving into the monster pit. Something must have happened. The rough seadogs at last left him alone. He noticed the Captain's fist shake in way that must have been involuntary. He spotted the amethyst coil tucked into the huge belt. "The Treasure." Ioz mumbled under the wind so that no one could hear him. "Noy jitat-" He swore as he experienced a painful sting in his arm, fighting Bloth's angry goons had shed too much out of him. From the way the man-beast reacted, Ioz concluded his friends were safe. This may have been the one and only chance the opportunistic avenger would have to act. He forced himself to his feet, seizing his sword with quavering hands. "You pasty naja-dog..." He scorned and stretched his blade aloft before the leviathan of a Captain could react, who was much too distracted in mounting over the upheaval below. Bloth's eye proceeded to hinge when Ioz rapidly struck out but the dynamic blow had not come soon enough, the diabolical opponent still capably pulled out a pettier sword to block. "This is for Ren, rotten dartha-eel!" Ioz thundered and unleashed his blade again, but this time it contested with a strip of metal cemented in a rigid fist of a behemoth. Ioz fatigued to position himself upright, his enemy now glared upon him with a loathsome antipathy.

"Ioz." The malicious Pirate Lord said his name, always merciless when he did. Ioz backed up. "You know what your father said..." Bloth began again. "When he met his end at my men's hands." The cruel brute belittled him. He fast approached on ponderous steps and his towering embodiment loomed over Ioz's trembling and ireful frame. He cleaved a gargantuan sword raised overtop of the fighter's ebony scalp. He advanced close and set, about to strike. Ioz did not move.

"I know what he said, kreld-eater." Ioz burned with immersed wrath, his midnight eyes focused toward his nefarious ex-boss and he paused. His memory came gushing back and he started to lose it, but he stilled. He contrived a distraction. "He said you would go down with your ship!" He yelled out as he jabbed the saber for his oppressor's unguarded and gelatinous stomach which did not make contact but caught the savage off-guard. He swiped his blade a slight to the left and tore the Treasure away from the broad-rimmed sash. The magical gem vamoosed, it flew about the stern a dot short of a descent overboard. Bloth had been stunned, Ioz shot to prehend the Treasure. He had practically reached it when he heeded to dodge another razor, some mass of a hurricane's pace leapt at him from across the board. He lapsed down on one knee in a slide and then vulnerably on his back, he had been overturned. Mantus's spindly form poised from over as Ioz stretched for the Treasure on the ground. He was imposed to swing his own protectively, meeting the steel of the master swordsman.

Mantus's harsh and unpleasant laugh shattered upon Ioz's ears. "I'll make dagron bait from your pulverized bones, abhorrent swine!" The commander's scratchy and scathing words filled his quarry with startling dread.

Ioz blocked one optimally aimed strike, and then another. The ring of sharpened metal against Ioz's Not-perfectly as pristine blade sounded through the air as the few remaining onlookers abound the deck rallied in a gathering.

"Get em, Mantus! Yeah!" The crowd of voices jeered and called on, growing in numbers. The blade paused, the antagonist loosened and then returned to his prowling stance as if to warm his limbs.

Ioz rolled to evade a further attack from the relentless machete as Mantus drew it diagonally, he saw the wretched and victorious snarl crossing the haggard face of the opponent. His vision started to spin, he descried two flint-tufted commanders about to deal him a finishing blow with a spotless and verily-clean slicer. He heard that leviathan, that gelid eel blustering a laugh of jubilation. The Pirate King seemed to be talking to his second-in-command, dispensing encouragement and words of praise to the worm. The sick ruler prolonged in spiel, taking pleasure in his final moments. "By my sword...I won't let you..." The nigh-throttled swashbuckler mustered the stamina to say. 'Really, Ioz. I remember him screaming for another chance. Finish him, Mantus.' Ioz heard the vague and crooning derision emit some scorn of what his ears imagined. Rowdy howls and chants rampantly followed. He arduously steeled his sword in front of his chest and reached for the spiral jewel.

Fetid waters swam with small and mystifying creatures, which were nipping at anything in realm. Many voices of men growled within the complex and bony tunnel, boots stormed through the slushing muck.

"They didn't see us." Ren whispered in a shushed counsel, he and Tula were submerged behind a crevice in the backway of the sewer. Two soaked heads were completely underwater except for the thin fabric of refuse that allowed some respiration. Hooligans scattered through the exceptionally empty cavern, not fully sure of objective. The grunts tussled around at things seen until they gave up and stomped off in another direction to search. Ren threw the dirty remnant off his face. He pressed his way up, offering Tula a hand for balance. Two sets of eyes scoured the resigned cave. "We should find the loading dock, I think it's on a level higher up. If I can remember right." Ren mentally frisked, trying to own a clear picture of his surroundings. From the set of tracks to Nimbo's remains where the constrictus had horrifically chomped all but his sea-star mace, he spun in a lurch. "Delta...? Tula said you were killed by Bloth, after Jazhea betrayed you." His expression jarred. To his brim was the amphibious woman, dry and standing alone along the skirting jetty within the kravidorm.

"No, she promised me a share of her gold for being her accomplice. She would encourage Bloth to throw me in here so she could get what she needs from Bloth's commander. That Was the plan. Naturally, I don't know what's going on above. I'm waiting for her signal as we speak, she's to send a blue jellican if our procedure is go or red if she needs my help. Now I'm going to send red because I haven't heard from her." Delta crossed her arms as she whispered to the pair in the salty trench. Contrary to her previous skimpy presence, she was now wearing a robe similar in make to a wetsuit. Her heel was moved and squashed over what seemed to be a crimson slug. Red smoke coursed through the clammy air and with a squeak the critter was immediately restored to it's inflated portion.

"If you're a team, then why would she need to betray her friend?" Ren did not agree, valorously not believing the explanation.

"Am I dead? We are a team. I'm more physically comely than she is. Also, she's better at spying. Bai newt are related by blood to Constrictus, like second-cousins. I've been using it as a transport to keep out of the bilge-water. It thinks I'm one of it's own. Bloth's constrictus is a stag, not an unaffectionate roe." The freshwater swimmer dispersed confusion as she marched for another slug, she promptly stomped it until it complained and released it's musk.

"That's affectionate?" Tula questioned the peculiar phrase.

"To you, that's hungry." Delta straightly clarified.

"Sorry, Delta, but the constrictus has been destroyed, our Treasure has done so as a consequence." Ren informed the distant guest of the news, but Delta did not seem all too pleased.

"Then you've destroyed my only way out." Delta trammeled one more impeded grouse before sliding away and into a side burrow.

"Delta, wait! She went...that way!" Ren sloshed out of slough, chasing after the deranged vagrant with a singular will for her to desist. He could not catch up and the mule speckled of turquoise and salmon constrained from his searching purview, disappeared completely.

"A secret passage?" Tula theorized at the loss of their possible aide. She pranced through the barren tunnel Delta went through, after Ren's footsteps. Both red and blue jellicans mottled the walls around them, a blue slime dropped atop the ecomancer's ebony hair from the taut ceiling and released an icky gas. "Jellicans aren't harmful, but they sure do stink. Delta must have nostrils of steel to try to use them as a distress signal." She almost coughed at the nauseating stench as azure dust lit up the sector.

"Tula, I have an idea. Maybe if we step on enough of these, Bloth will send his guards and they'll unlock the gate to the deck above." Ren subtly proposed after witnessing the secretion.

"It's worth a try, maybe I can help attract them." Tula aligned with the strategy, lifting her fingertips to her temples to centralize her incantation. The mix of the twain vermin scurried to her from all over. Squeals and spring-backs were sounding from the trampled bugs as Ren flattened the bouncy creatures underfoot, forcing them to add their expulsion to the accumulating cloud.

High above the locked duct underneath the Maelstrom, a purple fume converged from the vent of the constrictus pit. The captain sniffed to a twinge of the malodorous odor consuming the air.

"By Kreb, what manner of kreld-con is this?" Bloth wretched at the haze that was pouring out of square fixture. "Go below and seal the gates!" He directed to a trope of saluting cutthroats who trudged off, later setting his sight back on an entertaining squabble.

"Noy borga, why does it have to go out now? What is Delta doing...I can't see either color. No." Inside a trivial nook, the flash of the insidious leak faded from a rogue heiress's eyesight.

"It's you, wench, what are you doing?! You're coming with us!" The barrel fell and rolled as another hightailed in the opposite angle of the noise, coincidently dropping into a hatch but not before being painfully clobbered from her watch. From a cranny between stations, a red shadow flung to her aid.

Scorns of vulgarities ripped across the plagued plane where the ambushers anticipated an action.

"Where in Aymara's fogweed is it coming from?! It smells like someone left a yuugla-steak in the latrine! Help me look!" Down from a concealed slope, a snarky marauder waddled to a ridging platform as he pinched his nostrils in disgust.

"Guh, I dunno!" Another brute doddered.

"Don't just waste a good steak and potatoes when it's less than five degrees capsized!" Ren obstructed with a nimble taunt as he scrunched more squeezable vapor mites with his boot toe, flooding the atmosphere with violet.

"It's you, jitata sea-pup! Come back here!" The initial of the sore men stormed after a laughing sandy-blond but through the smog did not see Tula in time to prevent her from bashing him past the dungeon threshold. Ren and Tula bolted for the exit, cycling the lock shut. "You can't leave us in here like this!" The Maelstrom pirates wailed, choking on the abhorrent fragrance.

"Maybe just over that wall." Tula suggested as she slushed over to a nearby barricade, which looked climbable. "The lever to the hatch should be around here somewhere. Look, there's the steps!" The expeditious ecomancer motioned as she pointed at a stairwell behind an otherwise sealed door. Undoubtedly, the passageway had been opened to admit the invaders. Quickly, the duo clambered up and were at last greeted by the internal gulf for mooring stray vessels. Inside the jetty, a stoop progressed steeply to the above-ground and was positioned in the outstretched breadth. Beside it seemed to be a very bulky lever and a kind of crank to a valve which appeared formidable.

"Help me try to turn this." Ren beckoned to Tula as he tread forward and ascended up the steps for the helve. "I think it just needs to be shifted." Tula hustled over to help Ren rotate the heavily-wound cycle at his stammering signal. To the prince's and the ecomancer's superb astonishment, the handle moved easier than originally envisioned and began reeling chaotically out of hand. The heavy chain around the spool started rapidly unwinding and sinking into the water below the stairway. Ren shot across from Tula, striving to pull down the lever. "Noy jitat, it's stuck!" The prince roused with frustration as it would not budge. "Give me a hand, Tula." Ren again called for aid as he pushed with every peak of brawn on the switch. Tula followed suit and had began to feel that it might move, but neither could throw enough weight behind the momentum to create any sort of dent in their efforts. "Bloth must be the only one who uses this thing." Ren cursed within a toilsome pant, his tactics were inadequate. "We'll use the chain!" He averted away, briskly formulating a plan.

"Hurry up, Ren. I think I sense something!" Tula yelled a worrisome warning. On Ren's command, they corralled the chain from the valve and tethered the binds around the resistant baton. They fastened on the links like a tug-of-war rope and straddled against the lake, making sure not to tumble. The switch threw with a brunt and before the two shipmates knew what was happening, they had been drenched in the current of profane water and they were spilling into the submersion outside. The laden wave tried to sweep them away, they zoomed out through the maw of the destroyer and snagged the line. To Ren's perturbed concern, his female seafarer had drifted a lengthy orbit from his stature, hardly latching to the links and enacting to hang on.

"Tula! Don't let go, I'll be there soon!" Ren cried out to her, he heard her tousle in return but the waters were incessantly burking her too far away and too fast. He saw the woman he had been within an arm's reach an instant ago whisk out to the contrary side of the Leviathan's trapjaw. He did not panic and he emboldened to swim with the intention of reaching her and pulling her to rescue. His eyes menially displaced in the direction the muck spewed out, his face went cold when he viewed only a dash of purity awaiting them. His mouth formed a silent scream.

In the heavy rain, what little remained of the band on the deck loitered and swarmed in a packing ring around two men aiming for the other's throat. It would have been a greater battle, but there was a noticeable difference of stamina between the participants. The discounted swashbuckler hugging the floorboards pressed a blade up in defense at the slimmer but more fearsome aggressor overshadowing. The contender on the ground did not have any steam left. Thunder erupted in the distance.

"Get 'em! Yeah!" Jeers in the halo around the match flooded the stony air.

"Can we join in?" The bumbling and distinctive ambition of a meandering pirate called.

"Not so fast, Mantus has to keep in shape! Go Mantus!" Another plunderer's reply rebounded.

"He's finished!" One execrating laugher commented.

"Go ahead, you yellow-bellied scoundrel. Do it. Stay on this ship and follow it's corrupt Captain until your jitatan-untimely end." Ioz shuddered in a last taunt. He lay on the floor, glazed up at that miserable cutthroat about to deal him a finishing stroke. He saw the evil tarns wince murderously at him, cleaving hand pointed menacingly at his throat. "What do you want with this?" Ioz was clapping his memorial ornament underneath his neck, but he responded to Mantus's reach for it. He felt and heard something. The attacker purled a head around at a demand of his attention.

"Mantus! Avast!" Bloth outcried with plausible startle. He felt a shift, someone had opened the hatch. The huge miscreant trampled for the front of the vessel as if he needed confirmation regardless of apparent knowledge.

Mantus steered his attention away and Ioz shifted to get up, but not before the wiry varmint had retreated at a reason of severity. Furious shouts were bursting from all over the bow, all hands were called on deck. Ioz rolled his head to peek at the Treasure moving with the vibration. This may be his only break, he flipped over onto his frontal and with a wriggle, salvaged the Treasure. He reached out and just caught the glimpse of Mantus's vengeful and promising eyes when diving off the stern and into the sea underneath. He spotted the commander skittering all the way to the anterior. "Another moonrise, Mantus." Ioz pursed as he slammed the water with a splash, fortunately he sustained the Treasure with him because he otherwise would have been fodder for a black inescapable.

Among and nether the drooping bow, two humans scrambled for any article of solace. The sea did not relay pity.

"Hold on, Tula! We'll be out soon!" Ren called out to his partner through the scabrous waves, dark water teemed from all around. He slunk down the long chain for her, at last accomplishing a hold on the woman's hand. He gripped her like a lifeline as he tried to fight against the deluge and the rush of bilge-water that was concussing out into the sea. He scrounged for anything he could tack on to, he did happen to see the Wraith a separation away. He spied the closest thing to him, which was the jaw of the Maelstrom. His nemesis still possessed the Treasure and Compass. He towed the lass toward his goal, his catastrophic luck wafted him close to a dire pool of dark amassment.

Above on the deck, yells of rage echoed from the helm. Rain pelted the dingy tier and wind violently whipped about. Storm clouds in the gray skies churned.

"By the abyss, they've escaped! Find them!" Bloth thundered, outrageously appalled as he stood portside and barked out furious orders. Half of his entire crew had been sent to shut the hatch, which started swallowing too much water. He heatedly beheld the flood far down from his position, the dark patches were beginning to fill way but still harbored in safe locale. "Mantus, take us away from this smilge!" He shouted to his underling to return to the wheel. That was, until he noticed something below. His eye managed to fix on a mark, two torsos toiling for something to securely cleave to. "Wait, Mantus." He recalled his order, trifling with his beard as his mouth twisted into a smile. "Go down below and withdraw the valve to the intakes!" He bellowed out as he wheeled around and pointed for several men on the platform who nodded with compliance.

"Yes, Bloth-what?" Mantus responded obediently, pausing at the recent change.

"Hard to port, Mantus. One more turn and we will overpower our enemy's friends for good..." The Captain's sinister cackle avowed. Mantus muddled over the order and he too lowered a glint, he then grinned wilily. Obliging, he made that one hard turn.

"Captain!" The groaning invoke from closeby fell on the air. Bloth turned around and was greeted by a severely-stressed piglet. "Dark water off port!" Konk pointed out with warning. "The boy hid the Treasure, Sir!" He grimly paused before he made his next announcement, his brow recoiled with jitters.

The evil-eyed superior darkly tilted only his pasty head to the midget. "What did you say, Konk?" The Captain growled lowly at him, giving his audience a hole in the pit of a fat stomach. "Morpho?" He attended to face in the opposite direction at the inhuman abnormality next to him.

"The Treasure is still on the boy's ship, Bloth." Morpho related in accordance.

"Shall I dispatch Reotozz to compensate for Konk's failure, Milord?" Mantus offered but Bloth growled. He resumed his activity, not needing to be told no.

Bloth became enraged at the piglet and marched forward to lift him off the ground but then felt a massive shift. The Maelstrom hinged to the side. "Blast!" He yelled out. He swiftly let go of the pegleg and spun around on one foot, antecedent to the steering mechanism.

Down below a massive mask of bones, two survivors were giving everything to clutch on to a single strand of metal links, the last yoke to safety.

"Tula, go ahead of me!" Ren shouted, his fierce and rain-colored eyes jolting to his friend whom he supported in his arms. She clenched on tight but the two of them were perilously close to a puddle of black mud. Ren had began to throttle back farther.

"No Ren! It's just up ahead!" Tula urged up the chain, trying to pull the gentle lad behind her forward. Then the chain started to truck as if it were being reeled in. The two pioneers' eyesight met on rough-molded grunts attempting to pull the length of metal inward. In their hands were painfully well-forged weapons, some protruding with polished spikes and blades of luster. The many leers cast eyes on the young and writhing heroes, lethal objects were being hurdled in effort to shake lose their grip as they tread away from the destroying sludge. The hookline from one of the contentious cutthroats blasted out next, almost coming in contact with Ren's flesh as it launched by.

"I don't think so, naja-dog!" Ren gritted through his teeth and took this opportunity to grab onto the wire and rip it out of the assailant's hands. The resulting scavenger skid into the cavern of the Maelstrom. The washing current lashed at anything in range, he withdrew the line. "Hold on, Tula, we'll let these kreld-eaters do what they do best." From the water, the regent-lad daringly directed, he fired the hook at the upper horn on the face of the ship. It achieved contact with one of the eye holes where the lumber spikes resided. Ren caught Tula's hand as he adhered to the cable and they soared away from the dark water to freedom up ahead.

"They won't be down for long." Tula mentioned, flying on the zipline. The double pair of boots planted on the bony facade of the leviathan relic and scaled for the top.

Dark water had began to touch down at the tips of the portside of the vessel, wrenching on the walls. Topside was a roar with shouts and clatter of footsteps as objects started to shove.

"We're in dark water!" Some screams rumbled.

"What is Bloth doing?! We're going to go down!" Shiphands' panicked uproars carried out. Men scurried across the deck in a frenzy.

"We'll all gonna die!" Screamed one very theatrical sailor.

"There is one more Treasure on the move." Morpho followed up his earlier message.

"What?!" Bloth angrily backfired, he hastened to brace himself from flopping on the plank floor. "Turn Mantus, you brainless abomination!" He barked to the second-in-command steering the cruiser and battling with an unstoppable pressure below.

"It won't budge, Sir! It's the dark water!" Mantus bleated out, tending to his captain with terrified bugged-eyes.

"By my soul!" The Pirate Lord trooped to where he could visibly see and to his affliction, observed the two figures mounting his crusher from the skull. "Sever the line and get him!" Several minions around him obliged and started scaling a way down to the intruding line at the pointing boss's command. "Must I do everything myself, Mantus?" Bloth fronted with a disgruntled growl and he gripped the wheel, adding his own strength to the pulls of the swordsman.

"It's going to break!" Mantus anxiously squealed and slipped, falling on the floor with a clunk.

The wrestling sea tossed, rain tinkered down on the red ship fighting way through the tide of the gusting storm. In a collision of misfortune, the Wraith's only scout-transport had not only capsized but broken apart.

Ioz had climbed up the deck of the Wraith he spied in the distance, the waves were giving him so much animosity that he presumed he would be tossed overboard. He fought to retain onto the spinning wheel which appeared to have a mind of it's own. "Chungo lungo, where is that craven-bellied monkeybird." Ioz mumbled to himself in absence of the red-feathered hybrid whom should have been at his side and pestering him. He executed a choppy turn for the approaching head of the titanic ship. Violent eddy bashed the hull and toppled him to the knee while he exerted to clutch to one of the spindles. "Niddler!" He called out again. Realizing he might not hear a response, he pressed to pull himself up and swagger on heavy legs to the railing of the Wraith, which he then saw was converging with dark water. "Noy jitat! If I get marooned or ship-wrecked that monkeybird is going to be the first thing I-" He tempestuously cursed and vaulted up high on the banister with the Treasure in hand.

Fair distance lower, the silence of the storeroom had settled out. The light from the compartment remained faint and limpid.

Niddler, who no longer heard the scuffle of groaning men nor objects being ditched and cluttered, emerged from his barrel. The monkeybird's ears envisioned yells sounding like Ioz. He squawked and shimmied up to the door of the cellar. He left the melon in the hiding place. "Ioz! Are you here? Where are you?" Niddler cawed and opened the corridor, causing the hold to fill with the little measure of light from outside.

"About time, Niddler!" Ioz shouted from the rail and pitched the Treasure in the direction of the flying species. "Dark water, now move!" He frantically hollered out. Niddler swat wings, productive with the jewel in primate arms to rid the schooner from the looming patch. Ioz impelled back to swerving the mechanism. "After you've done that, you can trim the sails!" The candid pirate instructed, in the midst of fighting the tempest.

"Yes, your highness." Niddler fussed and mocked, bowing with one folded hand. He swooped to the rope in front of him and alleviated the sail.

The skeletal face of the monolith began to cover with ugly and brutish men dangling from cables, a sand-haired man and dusky-maned woman had been tramping the way up with steady feet.

"Be careful, Tula!" Ren shouted out for his peer. He watched her sole slide, she had almost fallen. He skated down some to help her up, but she regained her footing.

"I'm alright!" Tula gasped, tousling to swing toward the nearest stationary ground. The mouth of the remnant briskly stabilized after the dark water below had been ceasing to gorge it.

"Need a hand?" To the heroes' surprise, Ioz hollered up to them from the flux. Marvelous astonishment abounded as the glimmer of the Treasure of Rule could be seen in his palms. Ren had been jutting his lane to the top when he swayed his head, one of Bloth's pirates had flurried right toward him with a gashing blade. He ducked but the cord had rattled and Tula lost her grip. She plummeted down deep under, she was going to hit the water until a pair of monkeybird feet clamped her shoulders and ferried her upward. The ecomancer's boots tapped down on the bridge between the vacant eyes of the mask. She tackled a climb up the cranium of the carcass, dashing to tow Ren up by the line, but a particularly unapproachable pirate-grunt had succeeded in slashing the rope. She screamed over to her crewmate, falling to her knees as another ruffian cornered her on the arch. She flashed out her cutlass to defend herself.

"Ren, be careful!" Nidder squawked, he dove down in a hurry to convoy his pal back up and into the air. He clung to the prince who was just about to clip the water.

"Thanks Niddler, I owe you one." Ren cheered with a peppy smile up at his feathered-friend.

"You can let me at the fruit stock later." The monkeybird yawped as he swooped up to where Tula now needed to fight off three grungy-goons. She swiped her knife and missed, the brutal-formed hoodlums only edged closer. Tula's feet were slipping on the bridge and indicated she would soon trip. Niddler hovered close, about to drop off his passenger. Tula's toe floundered but her grasp connected with her golden friend's ankle before she could decline. When the gale picked up, all three of the knaves slid off the crux of the nose. The monkeybird circulated through the nipping whirlwind, flying his two mates to the cusp of a towering deck blanketed in clouds, where their nemesis eagerly awaited.

The captain of the leviathan-sized battleship proceeded to peer through a looking glass at the dwarfed floater in the water, he saw the triad of the crew that had braved the climb up.

"Out of the storm and into the hurricane, fool prince." Bloth rent the glass eyepiece from his sightline and chuckled. "Mantus, prepare to attack as soon as they hit the Maelstrom. As for the Son of Primus, take him alive." His dangerous and dastardly instructions lingered as the lean outlaw next to him drew his blade with a sleazy puff for the intruders. Men positioned themselves about, ready to mobilize.

The bright and flying trio peaked over the edge of the boundary. The boots of two bipeds planted on the floor and the other took to the air, soaring up to a mast and situating a lavish height above. Ren stormed for a tough-set man. Tula somersaulted and scud to elude an advancing thug, she weaved and dodged through the heap. "Noy jitata!" Tula shrieked when she almost found herself crushed by a burning spar that clunked to the depths from overhead by a stray lightning shot. She listened upon a blare from the Captain and a number of subordinates who hurtled forth to put the fire out, then at her.

"Run the other way!" Both Tula and Ren screamed as they broke away from the blocked path and for a clearing brim. Tula was confronted by a new set of opponents, armed with dragonbows.

Ren slipped around the ignoramus who curved a blade at him, he spiraled to a nearby rope and swung from it to knock the man back and he observed a dragonbow tumble to the ground. "Heads up, Tula!" The athletic prince duly cautioned as he nimbly snatched the arch and shot darts at the rope that tagged up the mainsail to the mast, it dismantled and toppled over numerous pirates underneath. Tula wormed through a sea of troublemakers, evading the weapons. The woman flung her heel over a halyard and began to scale the mast. The brainless meatheads scattered to catch her, but mutually collided instead. Bloth had started to advance toward Ren, who now backed up. Ren shot the prevailing darts in the string but all met with cold metal of the grandiose Pirate Lord's blade. The Captain then bashed the weapon out of the young man's arms, the regal retreated farther.

"Ren, try to catch it!" The heroic lass's cry bounded from above, the winding roping flew down to the youth, but it abruptly halted. Bloth pushed the rig out of the way. Niddler swashed down in an attempted preemption but was batted away without inconvenience, arrows zipped at him and he touched back into the sky.

"Give back the Compass, Bloth!" Ren scrabbled out, being nervously unarmed. His crystal eyes disturbed to casting presence behind him and then again focused on the accosting enemy before him. His blue spots pointed to the broken weapon neatly tucked away in the cruel Captain's belt. He felt himself losing might quickly. Disastrously, his adversary could sense it. He tiptoed backward.

"This is where it ends for you, Son of Primus. I have little use to execute you now, but you won't be getting away this time, boy. I don't know what power you've acquired but when I'm through with you, it will be mine." Bloth established simply and smugly as he moved toward the dreading prince. His prey would back himself into a corner, Ren wouldn't be able to fight forever.

"You forgot one thing, Bloth." The roar of a female ecomancer tolled from high up. The foe's head slanted as the atmosphere skewed with a pause and something swishing forward. "We're a team!" Tula swung down on a depleted sail from above at her proclamation, the tread of her boots hit Bloth square in the jaw. The Captain fell off balance as the darling warrior sought to steady herself, she had fallen a little short from threshing him down. In a stealthy action, she managed to just clout loose the artifact sword from it's place around the turgid oaf's waist. She flipped to the floor and knelt down to fling it to Ren, but only delivered a swerve. Ren leapt for it, but it had been too late. The menace had regained his composure and struck the woman before him to the fringe with a bulky leg, she slumped to the rear. Bloth stomped on the blade where the young prince stretched to reach and shifted it out of range with a fat and clawed foot.

"A team that will fail!" The inflated egotist laughed in a victorious gloat. Ren stood up.

"Do you think you can really do this, naja-dog?" Ren nearly spat his discord. "Do you think you can just find all the Treasures yourself? You will fail, even if you obtain all Thirteen. The dark water is the enemy of us all, you of all should be against it! Dark water is holding you back from charting your course in some seas now. Are you going to wait until it barricades you from all twenty? Land is no longer safe. Remember that slug I told you about-there's something else out there besides the dark water, too." Ren gestured to the deranged and ill-formed humanoid that stood a length in reverse from his foe, Morpho. He fortified a distinct prominence, which coursed through his words as he conveyed his significance. Silence wafted over the deck before him. "Well I won't let you! Find them all but I'll never join you, and you'll only be hurting all of us in the end! Including yourself." He professed and stood his ground, trying to reason with the antagonist, which would ultimately be in vain.

Bloth examined the face of good across from him, momentarily taken aback by the courageous halt in action and by Ren's little speech. He then only let a cunning smile spread over his atmospheric lips. "Why not? I've taken everything else, I think I can take what I need from you, worthless prince. As well as from this world. Besides, the Master of the Treasures will control every square peak of the dark water in his hands." He paused and then he immorally scoffed. "But you forget I don't need you to join me, of course I can always...make you." One evil eye glanced down at Ren precariously as the pronounced words flew. The evildoer appeared to be in contemplation. "I will fail, why? The way you speak makes me think you know something of the Treasures. It is true, isn't it?" He leaned down in aim of intimidating the boy short of him, he proposed to read his objective's expression but Ren reinforced in moxie.

"The Son of Primus is..." Morpho commenced to announce as he approached with a hiss in his breath. He reached out a sticky tentacle to Ren but he had stopped, something else started happening.

"Bloth!" The voice addressing the Captain dashed into earshot.

Bloth glanced away from his quarry. "What is it, Mantus?" The Pirate Lord asked as he shifted his head.

"What may I ask, do you want done with this prisoner? She was caught snooping around in the mechanical ward, we have reason to believe she may have been tampering. I assume she's of no use to you anymore, Milord? If I may make a request, Sir, it's been a long time since I've had the honors..." Mantus suspended Jazhea up by one arm, sharpened sword wielded over her temple. He raised menacing brows at her as he petitioned his boss, many of Bloth's leering minions clustered behind him. Jazhea glared helplessly at him and then cast her regretful gaze at Ren.

"Bah." The Captain scorned, he gave her one gander and swiveled away. "I told you to get rid of her. Do what you will, but I want her off my ship as soon as able! She's caused me one too many problems." He directed nonchalantly as a crowd of men behind Mantus advanced with hopeful and vindictive jeers. Ren witnessed the cumulating scene, horrorstruck and upset. Bloth noticed this and then he surmounted only on his enemy with one cold and merciless squint as he drew a breath to evaluate. "Then again maybe she will, persuade, the Son of Primus to see things from...our perspective. Mantus. She is yours to demolish, personally, if the Son of Primus does not comply with our demands. You may employ your...Special Treatment." He smiled again at the prince as he cruelly negotiated his unconditional terms. The loud hoot of rancor rapscallions drew up behind him. Ren grit his teeth.

"Yeah, let's get 'er!" Zealously cheered some lousy seadogs in the swarm, metal flashed through the air. "Let the fish feed us! Yo ho! Yo ho! Let Mantus give us yuugla-meat and hearty slabs of dough!" The repetitive mantra drew up from all over the gathering of Bloth's pirates.

"Yo ho! Lets Mant' give us yuugla and blow down the ale lady we all go drink us ale and the eight pieces of bread! Yo ho! Let the fish seat us!" One man happily caroled a shanty.

"Matey ye doing it like, just no! Let the fish feed us! Winner winner, yuugla dinner, Mantus! Yarr!" Another shouted to respond.

"Yarr! It be thumbbites time! I gots 50! 50 drabuls says alive! I live for it!" Enthusiastically chanted someone within the bustle of disgusting bullies.

"Haha! Let's give 'er the ol' Maelstrom heave-off! Can we? Please? I call dibs on the first! I'll get the eel-prods and the soaking-scoos!" The despicable looter in the crowd savagely urged. "You're a smool-brain, Nak. The diluted variety won't do bilge for 'er, ye gotta use the real deal if ye want to see the full effect." He remarked in response to the previous pirate.

"Hold it dimwits, Mantus is first!" Another, more shrewd, bandit jeered and barged in. "There's plenty of Korba-weed left from the guy we starfish-baited last week. Shall we bind 'her feet for the ripping, Mantus? This hostage is yo-ho-chukka-ho-wa!" He eagerly solicited the insidious man in-charge.

"That won't be necessary, Norkor." Mantus sinisterly hissed. "This wench is completely useless without a dagron." His cunning voice crooned through the air in a despicable banter. His polar leer viciously focused upon the barbed dagger at his waist, another vulgar rogue at his side loosened it from his belt. Jazhea crumpled her eyes shut.

"Let's get this sea-circus started! Give me that!" The treble howl of a quad-handed mutant pushed as he swiped Mantus's dagger from the other raider and spun it through the air, watching it sail into a wooden stake. "I didn't miss any fun, did I Mant'?" Strand recited awfully, braying at the possibility. "Here it is. Same one only for disruptive grotto-hulks of prisoners and unruly dagrons." He snickered with encouragement as he and handed over the object to the second-in-command, which promptly replaced in fist. Mantus lashed a barbed cat-o-nine-tails of razorbeak-tooth he only used for the worst circumstances, to demonstrate.

"Choose wisely, Ren. Unless you want the festivities to begin, and for your darling blood-sister to provide my men with extensive Merriment. It's a very fun spectacle indeed. No one ever survives, of course." Bloth's detestable smile skimmed to the hostage and then back at Ren as he invigorated a horrendous laugh.

"You can't be trusted, Bloth! How dare you go this low!" Ren strained to conceal his vulnerability with sensible judgment, but failed to cover his revulsion.

"Low, is that what you think? Ren, you know I am a man of a fair bargain. This bracken harpy of a wench has caused more trouble amongst my men and unnecessary work to be rewritten than the Tides of Tornadica, why under the Moons' Blood would you think I would want her on my ship? I would have taken care of her myself, but it seems Mantus has grown quite fond of her and will take her off my hands for me. Of course, I'm always willing to listen to other proposals." Bloth dictated his terms with all sincerity, not a inkling of wavering hinted throughout.

"Time to repay your debt, Princess of Octopon!" With a spiny crack of motion Mantus hatefully laughed. "Let Ren and his allies watch and try to stop us. Whether she is shown any comfort this time depends on their willingness to negotiate her ransom. They should hurry, unless they wish to encounter what a real pirate-swordsman can do. It's wearisome, like finding Cardinal Points on a Rose, to have them drawn under dagron-claw and slowly disassembled." He dryly supplemented the other thugs aching for desecration.

"He has to be lying or he won't have any leverage, he needs her!" Tula renounced in a gasp from an aphotic sector behind the mast, shaded to the side. Heads of the dirty-cheating underlings buzzed in her direction but no one heckled her. Niddler remained nowhere to be seen. The sound from a pair of sandals ran over a halyard aloft. Mantus threatened Jazhea with the whip until she fell to the board, she hit her head hard and he smoothed his pointy beard to think.

"No he's not! At least, not in a way he knows he can't exploit. I refuse your offer!" Ren bellowed with a frustrated fury. He could not let Bloth hurt her, though she had betrayed them. He would have to save her, regardless of who she was to him, anyone whom Bloth wanted to hurt was a victim and not the enemy. Unfavorably, he had caught himself backed into a corner. He would have to think of some way out. He witnessed but one solution, a collapsed boom that was unattended and unnoticed as it creaked over the pudgy skull. If he could only work quick enough to move, his pupils twitched left and back again. Mantus had arranged the cutlass barely above the girl's collar and seemed to be appreciating her fear from a lazy pose. Jazhea was still defiant, despite being stepped on.

"Wait, Mantus." Mantus ticked his silvery glance at the summon. Bloth reached out to dispose of the groaning rod. It tumbled away from his scalp in an enormous smash. "Let's make sure she doesn't lie to us." The overlord strictly modified his cruel proposal for the sufferer. Mantus shrugged and tipped the edge to near the prisoner's feet, the blade ran too far from her neck. Then Jazhea's growls and curses became screeching thrashes. Arrogance was transformed into the kind of cowardice that required rescue from an aunt and a mother, a cousin as well. After her lips ran cold, every other beast and lifeform known by woman ran blaring out of the pitiful wailer.

"You can leave her alone, and you won't get the Treasure." Ren pended with chaos, his hands trifled from his sides. His eyes drooped downward and he tormented with review until he returned back up and prepared to speak. "Bloth." He frowned at his archnemesis as if about to say something nauseating. Bloth extended him a twisted grin, impending victory.

"By the Trust of Myelkah and Toishok, the Lifeblood of the North, I wield your defense to discharge these enemies!" Then a spiral of water crashed over the proximate hoards of watchmen. The flood slammed to border the chamber of beasts.

"Nimbo?!" Tula watched the quick-footed thief clatter out after the spell took root. Both of his sandaled feet swiftly ran and stepped atop the railing. "Didn't the Constrictus-" She gasped when he assasinated the Maelstrom thieves with that longbow like they were paper soldiers. He was so nimble in that red uniform, and yet she swore when he slowed down for one instant he tilted her a comforting smile.

"Fish feet doesn't catch ale an' mateys' wonder why yuugla-meat is best cooked raw. No Wing-fish serve us overboard, please!" The rattle of a chain affixed to a nearby hatch accompanied a crazed shriek from a plump detainee.

"Natchut!" Mantus hurriedly exclaimed. He coiled his head about in surprise for a source of noise and motion filling the skies to the right of him. "The dagrons! Who has released them?!" He growled with flickering ire. He deflected eyesight at the coop leading to a lower chamber of the ship where an entire colony of dagrons were pouring out, the squadron under his direct control was trying and failing to reign in dominion.  
Jazhea's captor was sore and had taken upon defacing her left eye with his dagger. He fetched the hostage, but his brace on her loosened after the other pirates scattered. Jazhea smashed free from his arm then tore away with all the punch her stamina would allow her, scooting to the rail bordering the stern. The fallen victim was snatched up by a familiar entity, who dove into the water with a side-winding flip. Mantus cursed and slashed his steel in opposition.

Ren saw the opportunity and hurtled for his blade as Tula tossed it to him from the otherside of the bombastic plunderer, she hastily bolted way past the multitudes of frozen men.

"Nice one Tula!" Ren praised as he scurried for an eventual avenue to the Compass.

"You raffendian fools, get them!" Bloth blasted out, enraged and screaming. He beckoned for his enemy and the scoundrels at his disposal started to move in on Ren. The aristocrat discharged a kick-flip off of a nearby line and spied a squawking ball of red feathers whooshing for refuge from the provoked monsters above.

"What would we do without you, Niddler!" The blond noble admired as he nodded up at his best-buddy, who saved the day. The scarlet flutter sped closer into view and then congregated on the pompous hellion's neck, shouting chattering notes. The monkeybird toted the blue light over the bony blockade.

"Here on the Maelstrom we'll wreck you up, boy!" Ren yowled when he narrowly rolled away from the guillotine at the end of Mantus's turbulent temper.

"You not get away, monkeybird! Here be dagrons!" Konk at the ledge grunted out, he mightily squeezed Niddler by the leg and freed the Compass to return it to his master.

"No! You're, not getting away! Jitatan piglet!" Tula asserted, she weaved around curves in pursuit of the paltry midget.

"Mantus! Catch! There be dagrons." Konk yelled apprehensively with Tula on his trail and without any more forethought, he irrationally lobbed the cerulean gem at the cadaverous swordsman, who floundered to gather his bearings.

"You idiot pig-brain!" Mantus castigated the numbskull, Ren intersected in a slide and nabbed the Compass.

"Thank you Konk, you've helped us a shipfull!" Ren graciously thanked the chunky villain, then spiraled to ditch for the ridge to jump off. He rebounded to his feet and saw that Morpho had stalked for him and began to corner, he watched the rancid ill-born sweep the tentacle and the shriveled hand with the intent of snapping up a victim. Loosing his torn shirt, speedily he stole an object for landing. He tried to back up, but he lost his balance and spilled upside-down then headfirst off the platform. Bloth exploded in rage as a fleeting dagron bumped the mast and a clunky spar of timber broke off and tore the sail. Tula spun from a rope, slinging up to pluck a protruding strip of the fabric aloft and swayed herself into the water. "Looks like the wind is really against you. Right, Bloth?" Ren gleefully fired a last taunt before he dunked to the bottom.

"So you think, get them!" Bloth hammered his knuckles as Ren dissolved safely among the stirred mist, his restless tongue chanted foul as the rider of the reptile shrugged.

"You'll have to do better than that to catch me, Bloth!" Ren discovered the item he lifted from the Maelstrom was infact a sea-sled, which he propelled to zoom through the skipping tide. He stomped the pedal midwater and a squid launched.

"I promise you will rue the day, curse you!" The Captain of the Maelstrom swore while he wiped the squid-ink from his face. Ren gathered Tula to his seat aboard and scud into the veiled horizon.

The fossil's sail flapped and flopped to the brawling floor. "The dagrons have already been fed, but your bones will serve me well with another chore...at least until they fall from the last of your shed blood." The commander chuckled at Lus-nayi's wrist bucking to be seperate from his slimy clutches when he tossed her blanched legs over his back to carry her shallow flesh off to a holding cell. "Noy borga. So it's true hm...that task will be a reward for you but first, I have an easy job for you to do...Get to work!" Mantus gleed in the scrolled parchment he was left by one of his lackeys as the wrung-out sister clenched a ripped jib in her attempted egress. The blessing of a job well-done came in the form no payment needed, Mantus noted as he kicked the old sailmaker to dregs. Tears of the gentle seamstress dripped as the barbs from razorbeak-tooth dug into her soft skin.

"She's not meant for that!" One rascal who promised any sympathy for the unheard subject was ignored, his voice cut off.

"Then we'll fit her anyway." Bloth allowed his second to handle the grotesque task he dallied not with.

Lus-nayi did obey Mantus's orders from sunrise to moonrise but she wasn't moving fast enough on the sheet folds and he punished her with seven more welts from the barbs of the flogging tail, his nagging snicker flooded through the Maelstrom's army as she pained to the floor in gasps and moans. Bloth charged Mantus to speed up once more, which caused Lus-nayi three more wounds that would leave a lasting dent on some parts of her flesh.

"Girl, run! Now. Take...your hands...off!" Creeping from out of the unguarded aperture once the Constrictus pit, was a raging vixen who had seen it all. "Mantus, you may not believe in showing mercy to any servant you don't have to pay coins for, but...I do!" Delta grabbed Mantus's whipping wrist to prevent another mark from being laid down on Lus-nayi's scabbed back and as she plowed her fist at his jowls, her punch hit in the only way a slum-tramp to the sleaziest of Mer's pirates ever could hurt. Mere instants zipped by before shocked workmen resumed from their stun and Lus-nayi performed a desperate nosedive off the railing before Delta hooked Mantus by the golden earring in a vicious rebellion. "You know, I think you'll find I'm the perfect scamp for a crook like you, Mantus, and I'll think you'll agree...Go ahead, men, line up and I'll show you what I mean." She vivaciously shook her curvaeous hips. Mantus sneered endlessly.

The flashes of pink and navy hit the fine but tumbling crest below, the shapes bathed deep and reemerged. Faces met and lungs filled with air, the two clasped to each other and tread the waves, searching for something to latch on to. The rope smacked to a landing in the spritz by the forms of the duo as a summon from an immediate clipper called out.

"Ren! Tula! Grab on! Ay chunga we're pulling out of here before we get apprehended by that blue-lipped raver and his depraved bilge-scourge! Hurry up!" Ioz shouted out from the Wraith. From what the shipmates could see, he tried to expedite away from the enemy ship. Ren fingered his hands around the cable and Tula clutched it tightly from the brink. They rode closer to the sunset hull of the craft, at long last able to climb up to their own tier. Ren let out an excited sigh as he straddled over the wall, he walked on sealegs back to the wheel where Niddler kept the ship as steady as possible for a monkeybird. Tula heaved over the string and slid over, lowering to a rest against the barrier of the ledge.

Ren caught the wheel and actuated, steering off from the behemoth warship hounding astern. For what felt like forever the Wraith made speed against the scout-ships razing on them like river's tears spurting from a hurricane. Bloth's unstoppable directives clapped from the dragging crusher, blood-cries to sink plywood and pilfer royal fortune. Arrows rained down from dagrons and pelted from every craft. "I'll have your back, woman! Tula?!" The action had taken to deck as Ioz rapped metal against invading gangs, and one invader in particular. Nimbo protected the most hazardous fold of the shaky level. Tula was thrown into the scuffle only to ready for her squash under a plummeting trunk of physique. The unconscious clod fell by the wayside, Nimbo undressed to show his true self.

"Xiluk?!" Tula's flitting brow gleamed above at her unexpected savior. The Kree teen had pulled away the trespasser by the collar, plunging him harmlessly to the back of the exasperated ecomancer.

"No time, sea-flora! Aim and fire!" Xiluk beamed at Tula with a grace of admiration for one instant before drawing from the quiver above his loincloth and beating back a longbow, sending the heads of the shots through the hearts of five raiders. He shimmied to the peak of the mast and after walking a length of cordage strewn by the enemy, decimated three more.

"Xiluk! He's the one who helped me flood the guards on the Maelstrom so I could toss the vagrant overboard!" Niddler genially squawked to the above sojourner.

"By the barnacles of Gantha Isle-!" Ioz gratefully interjected. After Xiluk had removed the remaining danger, the vigorous boy jumped down to secure a parcel of surplus goods laid under a blanket he kept. He had only gone halfway before a dreary chuckle ruined the harmony. Konk sailed the prime of Bloth's dories. The runt had apparently spotted an existent vital the crew had not because from the point in time after his hoggish sneer and words of Treasure and Boy only belong to Maelstrom, a clump reeled. From what sounded like the hull, a dynamic noise was present.

"Noy jitata! A leak!" Tula's warning rattled from overlooking the drifting jetsam thrown by the storm, water gushed out of a wound conspicuously visible from the following Maelstrom.

Part 2 Dissension

"A leak?! No!" Ren stunted in the moment of terror before the full realization of the impossible situation swelled into his impulses. "We have to outrun Bloth, there's an extra plywood-no there isn't." After a dreadful scour, Ren balefully concluded that the only spare part to be used was already employed on the expedition to the Maelstrom, and long gone. "Ioz search the deck for supplies! Niddler, trim the sails!" He hastily erupted the order without any more word. He made due in the only way he could under the reigns of the Wraith, but it was slowing. Ioz bolted for the entryway to the orlop.

"Wait! Take a flexible cloth and use some borca-paste to adhere half through the hole on the outer rim and half on the opposite end on the inside plating. It slows down the impact until you can find a replacement, they did it on the Maelstrom!" Jazhea cut in with a brash instruction, loud enough to be noticed. Xiluk helped her to sitting station from the blanket, pressing the cloth against a wound still fresh.

"Do it." Only a fragment of hesitation faded before Ioz charged downward. Tula chased after with the carton of the repair adhesive.

Ren oscillated the wheel that was sticking like a frozen Maalagar-hare. The battleship was gaining, but the wind was not flying well for either man. Ren witnessed the dryrotted slurry of wood-pulp blasting out after many moons of continual use and inadequate restoration. He singularly recollected the one section he and Niddler had fixed themselves after the Great Wave, the very section they barely touched on, save for what was necessary. It had come back to haunt him now. "Niddler! Take the wheel!" He knew he didn't have a choice, the crack prolonged and he would have to assist Ioz and Tula at all costs. The monkeybird slaved to seize his tasks under control as the Wraith began to slant to the sinking bearing.

"Ren, I'm fortunate to be taught by Iskjar. Go." Xiluk slammed forward to support the scurrying avian and the alarmed skipper. Ren took his drastic leave to the floors below.

Underneath the hindered deck, Ren was drenched up to his knees as he fought to brace the aching slip. The advice given was working until Ren tried to urge the material through the spurt and could not weld it closed. Ioz and Tula yelled as the abscess bucked and then backfired into a violent brook of outside deluge, torn asunder with an even more copious gape. The borca-paste was launched from arm's reach as the foundation hastened to drown.

"Ren, there's some excess scrap up here! Konk and his men left them behind when they were rearranging I think, but we have more trouble, Bloth's scout-ships are preparing to board! Xiluk and I need help!" Niddler's report echoed into the sloshing crevice. Ioz soon shot Ren the desperate signal to return, he and Tula held the fabric down with all the fortitude they could muster against the ravaging current.

"Ren, get a hammer before we're dead! Well, woman, it was nice crewing with you!" Ioz coughed as a spate of the ocean splashed his face. Ren raced up the stairs to the top level.

"Don't talk like that!" Tula hissed from pain as she clout her hands against the abrasive sheet that was not letting up.

Ren sped over the tilting surface, not wasting any time to grasp the needed materials. When he passed the helm he observed the nearing dinghies and Xiluk steering away with moderate capability.

"So maybe I underestimated the application for greater floods..." Jazhea grimaced as she excused herself to the flustered regal. What she told may have been accurate, but she forgot to mention that on the Maelstrom there were more than three full-bodied men assigned to repair each breach. Ren ignored her and recessed to the bottommost chamber.

"Never thought I'd be thanking Konk and his goons." Tula concurred when Ren arrived just as the flux became too much for all of them to handle. Nails were hammered into the sturdy perimeter and gradually, the blitz sputtered to a trickle. With the application of the reserve material and hefty coat of borca-paste, Tula and Ioz inhaled of impaired relief.

"Now we need a bucket, and a miracle." Ioz winced at the damage the percolation had caused. He stood in the slough. The Wraith was curbed by an untold extent and still out in the middle of nowhere, with only threat of further invasion to look ahead to.

Ren set out to search topside but what he witnessed before him caused him to halt in his tracks. "I think we've found it, Ioz." Ren shouted but could only be partially understood. The two shipmates evacuated to the prominent trouble.

"Niddler, make sure the dark water doesn't come too close!" Tula jolted her angle to the tidal flow, invoking the rosy bird cycling about.

"All clear! I hope there's something to eat when I come back!" Niddler announced with a ravenous hankering over faltering dregs, the dark water vanished in a fizz. Tula scanned the frontier. The monkeybird temporarily escalated from off port to break. Much of the dark water had been erased but more would brew ahead.

"I know the Maelstrom wasn't disabled this much, this is the third time he's been slowed." Tula assessed the peculiar event. Everywhere astern shone naught but sabotaging whips of darkness. It entangled anything within reach and flared up to form a divider between the Wraith and the Maelstrom, which was falling back despite being only a nosepoint from tapping their proximity. Mysteriously, the scout-ships were ringed but not consumed by black as they skated a long path around. It was then known their blockades prevented them from clapping rocky sedge. She watched the gray face recede as Niddler shuffled to a placement over the hatch. "Let's get a bucket and try to clean some of this away." She addressed the monkeybird to additionally aid their escape. Niddler pronged her a nod.

"Wait, I can help you with that, sweet Tula! Might as well try for two dents on my limit today." Xiluk brashly galloped to the stoop of the hold where the charmer and the feathered helper were about to retreat, offering his assistance once more. "I will need your help for this too, I will call upon the Protectors of the North and you ecomance the water, understand?" He petitioned for aid as gently as the afflicting circumstances would allow. Tula nodded and hurried. "By the Trust of Myelkah and Toishok, the Lifeblood of the North, I wield your vitality to disperse your creation!" With a sturdy breath and a grand invoke, Xiluk raised his summoning scythe skyward. The motion connected with Tula's swaying of the flow. The bilge water siphoned the stairwell high and ascended into a disc of energy. Ren and Ioz watched in awe for a thriving flash as the oceanic circlet screeched with a sonicboom and echoed to a sound of salty rain hitting the now salvaged vehicle.

"Forgive me for not doing so sooner. Our people are primarily healers, but the gods will occasionally lend us a helping hand." He shyly bowed at Ioz's smile and shoulder-pat of approval. He rejoiced in Ren's praise, but his high-boned cheeks flushed rose at the revisit of Tula and Niddler.

"Xiluk, did that blast change you?" Curiously, Xiluk's hair shone a duller blond instead of the near-white Tula had last seen on him. The nineteen-year-old stilled his budding muscles against the overlooking ledge.

"Ah, yes. The more I call upon the Protectors of the North, the darker my hair becomes. Until it is completely rust, of course. It's my source of life, more or less." Xiluk stroked his spiky locks, demurely smitten with interest as he grinned.

"Bloth can clean up his own mess. If only we could stay away from him." Looking back, Ren was drained to drive them out at a torpid pace.

"Well, there's always the lighthouse business." Niddler shrugged, munching a melon.

"I somehow doubt our foes are going to deliver us a helping hand next time." Ioz humorously cautioned Ren. Not in the spirit, he trudged to boost the rig into a fit state as he silently composed his mentality. He perused the additional roamer.

"I don't think they'll stop the dark water from closing in on us like it is right now. Our only hope is to dodge it West." Ren wearily alerted, the developing path was transforming into one progressively more difficult at every revolution. The water had been ejected from the compartment, and the Wraith was reverting to full speed. However, this was partially not a good factor, made worse by the number of stains on the surface of the blue. In his hand he clenched the spiral. He awed when it radiated for a very narrow lane, almost invisible. "Port, Ioz! To the prediction of the 10th Treasure!" Though he relinquished the abrupt command, he knew he and Ioz would need time to shift gears.

The airflow softly swung West. The trail of prosperous waves was again upon the travelers. "That Treasure really is the most useful when it's showing off it's sparkle." The vigorous buccaneer sighed comfortably at last, the vessel was tacked lightly to the drift. Rearward of the craft, the shadow continued to loom.

"I can feel the rushing zephyr it's leading us to." Ren angled a glance away and saw a sixth person present on board. "Jazhea." Ren motioned to her, but he steeled his gaze. She threw off the blanket and delicately ambulated for him, but refrained when Ioz flashed a blade in her way. Niddler whined as Ren steadied the keel through the water.

"Kreld-eater, traitor! Dartha-eel of a woman! Get off the ship or I'll throw you off myself! Lowly bilge-rat, you're not worthy of any honorable burial at sea." Ioz seethed with a heinous growl, inflection visibly unfavorable.

"Stop! I'm on your side, I swear by the two moons! It's not all that you think, I was taken by their crew and I couldn't leave unless I followed their ploy, I could only talk him into giving me a chance!" Jazhea diligently screamed, she regressed at the furious ex-pirate of Bloth, who was about to charge.

"Tell it to Bloth, reprehensible sea-slime! We both saw you billowing over your expansive scandal, now you want to lead us into another trap I'll bet! Consider yourself fortunate you're not dead here and by my sword!" Ioz boomed and essentially plowed out in full before he shuddered and missed. He proceeded to attack until Ren ordered him to stop. He withdrew, prepared to argue.

"Yes and I definitely want to lead us all into a trap so I can die before I reach the height of my remaining time! Listen to me, I'll tell you about the woman who can move dark water...if you stop!" Jazhea bit back with virulence. The uncovered eye emptily glared at the obtrusive hallmark of Bloth, still hunting and unchanging on the horizon. She grasped at the swelling bandage to her left, noticing nothing amiss other than it's presence.

"Ioz, don't! Take the wheel!" Ren keenly dictated to his crewmate, prompted to spring down from the helm.

"Ren! We almost lost our lives thanks to this fallacious woman!" Ioz abhorrently protested, undeniably very upset about himself and his friends needlessly thrown in harm's way. "She sold us out to jitatan Bloth! She's as bad as he is! Maybe it's not important to you but myself and Tula almost died because of her jitatan trick and she's trying to do it again! Becoming a meal for the Constrictus is not something anyone deserves for the likes of her! A pirate's penalty of betrayal is death, not by my own hands but a drowning will do!" He wrenched when Ren did not respond the way he wanted him to. Ioz protectively assumed defensive against Jazhea, who now clearly appeared to be dreadfully dismayed.

"Ioz, listen to Ren! This won't help!" Tula seemed torn when she arose, but she enjoined in the occurring scene. Xiluk observed from Tula's viewpoint.

"Ioz, there's no reason to shed blood. Think about what you would do if it were your own sister, you know everything this encounter cost me. Trust me when I say she really didn't mean any harm to us." Ren told Ioz, disheartened by the circumstance. He footed closer with dole eyes. "Don't you think I'm upset about his actions too?" He left his post to whisper firmly, as he needed to handle this. Ioz at last relented with a chary nod and retreated apace to take Ren's place, Tula and Niddler taking his. Ren shuffled to face the kin. "Why didn't you say anything? You know we could have helped you." Ren piqued with disappointment.

"Well...I didn't exactly try to escape when I was able to." The discouraged lady twisted her able eye, ruing in her reveal.

"How could you, Jazhea? You realize that nothing could have been gained by working with him! You would only betray our people, and our homeland." The majestic lad glowered at the sibling who bore the same golden hair as his own, he sharply incited for answers. "Only the Treasures of Rule can save Octopon, it's the reason we started this Quest. You know that. We can talk about this after we get away from danger." Ren epitomized to her, he knew she had ignored something vital with the flick of her head. They were trim for escape, but in the occasion this was too much for him.

Jazhea relinquished as her face showed guilt and certain regret. "Ren, I'm really sorry. I thought I could trick him, but I just put as us all in danger. I know I was a jitatan fool for thinking I could wheel and deal. I honestly didn't believe the Treasures could truly change things, but I know now." The green-eyed girl mournfully rambled on, she focused on null but her feet. Ioz was paying mind to the advancing flurry from abaft.

"You can't trick Bloth, he's too smart for that." Tula groused down with admonishment from adjusting the sail overhead. She too assailed the turncoat with acrimony, but she sensed real pain steeping in the impetuous woman.

"I just thought if I could come to power I would be able to restore our homeland like you want to, I know it would solve everything. Then I could find out what happened to Vaecusa, and my suitor. Bloth said his crew would take me back to the palace if I played everything right..." Jazhea glanced at the ecomancer, speaking solemnly. Her glazed eyes were watery, cast down sadly.

"You should know better than to try to take him on alone." Ren effectively reprimanded his dual heir, a consoling chagrin now talking. He was wrong in looking up to her in a more familiar aspect or for her to teach him about his past. "We need to get out of here." He charged, furrowing to Tula's division. He mulled over her recent account, he twisted the rope in his field of reach with a muscled elbow-pull.

"I know, but I didn't think I was alone..." Jazhea hummed below voice-level, she cradled the jade memento under her neck. For what seemed like a distant period, she was isolated on the flat. "He was the reason I doubted! I admit it, I used you because I thought you would protect me, but no one believed me anyway. I tried to warn you about what I couldn't see! He thought I was lying about men who can move faster than ten Gales, but he'll be regretting it soon, and not by me! He'll be regretting it by Z.M.Q. when he has us all by the throats like darva-rats!" After loosing her temporal docility she directed her blame at the helmsman, who was biting his tongue. Ioz mumbled a few poor claims to himself, not saying more but retaining his sense of hunch.

"We knew you weren't lying, so stop blaming Ioz. Delta was telling us the local word from town and it was important because it concerned our Quest. Misunderstandings can be deadly, you know." Tula instantly connected with the agitator's frustration. "That wound doesn't look so well, shouldn't you be resting? I honestly didn't think you would survive after Mantus stabbed you the way he did." She tensed at the impulse from the delicate exile.

"I can't remember...that jitatan kreld-jaw stabbed me in the eye...? Then as luck would have it, it wasn't important to me. I want another chance to figh-" Jazhea sounded genuinely surprised but she almost quelled and would have, if she had not quickened her facade away too short to reveal the Z.M.Q. letters etched into her shoulder.

"Not important? I'm sure you wouldn't say that if Xiluk hadn't saved you..." Tula dismally noted the specific concern. From her angle, Xiluk twisted a bitter brow.

"You're one of Z.M.Q.'s dogs!" Ioz instantly flurried with excitement, again drawing sword in defense. "I can't believe I didn't see it earlier! Z.M.Q. even makes Bloth nervous, no one's ever seen him! We have to lock her away, and permanently or we're doomed. Otherwise...she has to drown!" Ioz's tone shifted from anger to one laced with dread as he pleaded to do what he entirely believed in. Tula chided him, overwhelmed in the array of fury.

"N-no!" Jazhea abruptly flew her hands out at the impending doom from Ioz's words. "I mean...I used to! I'm not part of Z.M.Q.'s crew anymore, I swear! I've never seen him face-to-face! Delta would have been forced by Z.M.Q. to marry one of Bloth's crew. I needed Bloth's and Z.M.Q.'s protection but they held me in debt, honest!" She clutched her heart, overwhelmed by embarrassment as the situation only worsened.

"Marry?! Ay jitata!" Ioz ferociously spat, more than unamused.

"The Polar Prince from the land of the Frigid Mountains and the Evening Sun is going to take his dues with Z.M.Q. and I serve him now! It's not that I can't only see anything faster than ten Gales, I go blind whenever I'm hurt and it will worsen until I die! I'm blind as we speak, it was because of the purple mist that will eventually kill us all!" She desperately petitioned the dangerous rogue, shying away from humiliation. She tripped backward then, weak from the pain she couldn't bear but was ignoring. Xiluk dove to secure her before any damage occurred.

"Honesty is a real problem for you, isn't it? Once a Z.M.Q. seadog, always a Z.M.Q. seadog! I swear by my father Raymit's hand, I don't know who by the Hounds of Aymara this Polar Prince is but if you think paying for your mistakes with an eye is nothing, let's try with your life!" Ioz fully desired to toss the abomination. He did not trust a word, but a sensitivity of unease bothered him. He couldn't hold his cutlass durably enough to execute the stranger, and he sheathed.

"She speaks the truth." Xiluk shuffled to Ioz's advance, protectively barricading harm from the spurned traitor. Jazhea glared at the presence of Xiluk's voice. Ren tended to the miserable lass with inquest.

"You're a piece of work, clearly Primus did not give his majesty to you." Ioz interjected at Jazhea's perpetual idiocy combined with an inclination to break down in hysteria during any change of transit.

"I thought something was up when she said she couldn't stay with us. No, Ioz." The notion clarified Ren's unsure distinction. He only peered at her with instinctual puzzlement.

"I won't be like Bloth. Consider yourself lucky, Z.M.Q. Slime, but I'm not letting you out of my sight." Ioz did not retreat to his station because of Ren's shelter of the outcast, but because the lad would not take over for him.

"I could not risk flying alone so I needed Bloth's help. Unlike Xiluk, who can control how fast he dies by simply not calling on his gods to save him." Jazhea expressed acrid words.

"I just saved your life, didn't I? You're So tough, Princess. Why don't you just do what Tula says? You shouldn't even be up when you're injured!" Xiluk negatively renounced the acquaintance, attempting to guide the frail contender away.

"I lost an eye, not my legs!" Jazhea spit on the boards with no sign of regard for her ill-manners.

"Do you blame me because I didn't protect you from Bloth's men? Well you could have stayed in our village where it was safe after your aunt disappeared, grandfather Iskjar took favor on you! I didn't want you to go out on your own." Xiluk heartily argued, grieving what mess had been caused by Jazhea's brashness.

"How dare you, Xiluk! Would you have found Vaecusa and my potential suitor for me? Don't make me laugh. Let us see what you do when your only caretaker disappears without a trace, I'll bet you think I could return to Sir Phorlock, even though because of that invitation letter he's dead. It was a trap set for all of us, except for Kyn and Iskjar. Of course a smool-brained sea-pup as yourself was instantly left out as well as all of your ancestors. Bloth only knew of Sir Phorlock and Mizar, how your misfortune is So dreaded." Jazhea growled with a fit of clashing temper, collapsing over again.

"You're wrong. Bloth's men knew of my mother. You have no idea how important Supreme Kree Sheelia was in our village! She used her Devotion Song to save my grandfather because she knew her spirit had become rust, it should have never happened the way it did! You're wrong about another thing, Bloth knew of Teron and Sugii. Yet, you claim your lot in life was worse than mine because you lost your guardian?" Xiluk rashly corrected the tale by what she said. His brow sunk to a cold taut, this was what the scorned accompaniment of his past actually felt and believed.

"Why didn't you let me die today, Xiluk, is it because you know the settlement of the Quin, my adoptive home, shipped out and left recent Kalinda for Kuunda knows where? Because I couldn't return if I wanted to, or because you're pathetic? What shall I do for His Lucky Sea-Leech now that He has Tula as his new attraction, throw you both a ceremony?" Jazhea spurned Xiluk with ultimate contempt.

"Don't blame us for your dear Sir Phorlock not thinking fast. It's preposterous you would think I would know about he and his village in Kalinda being no more after being land-bound to Meridol North for twenty years since the crisis on Qui-Qua isle forced us to move. You've changed, and if that's what you want, then you've got it, Princess!" Xiluk effectively blew into a boiling temper, seething rancor from his mire.

"I didn't know you two knew each other like crew, but someone is going to be captured by Bloth's men if we don't get away from here! What have we brought with us..." The disharmony only seemed to strain Tula as she was loosing her effort to lift circumstances. It was unbelievable to her that this was the way she and Ioz fought most of the time. These persons were surely troubled, but the fact remained to her. Xiluk then embodied everything apologetic at Tula's influence.

Jazhea and Xiluk each incriminated the other of caring more about one thing, in phrase Xiluk replacing Jazhea's House with Xiluk's Village.

"You can believe this bilge if you want to, Ren, but I don't." Ioz, who listened to the conversation, severely brushed her off. "We need to go farther North if we're to outrun him. This gale will blow us off-course." He impended of the lashing torrent in the sky. The remnants from the vitriolic tempest were still present.

"If we're going to glide North, we need more visual. We're running out of sight range on Bloth. Where are Joiquiva and Lus-nayi?" Tula searched her neck to and fro for the Quin girls, who were entirely absent.

"Why do you think those useless runts will help? They fail at seamanship, they can't even tie a bowline! They're sissy flora-leechs!" Jazhea huffed like the North-Wind, crossing her arms.

"They're not as useless as you are." Ioz designated his revile to Jazhea, who was not saving efforts at all.

"You're back." Tula reacted to an arrival from Joiquiva, the missing bystander resurfaced prematurely.

"I bring sad news! Bloth's men have Lus-nayi!" Joiquiva wept immediately and wrest in shame, she slumped flat on her chest.

"She was my friend..." Niddler tipped his head in mourning.

The turbulence wavered in tangible longing for one more colleage seized from them.

"Please listen to me. It's my fault you all think I'm a fool, but it's worse than you think. What I tried to accomplish, there was no way at all. It was impossible. By the twin moons it was. I didn't mean any harm! I just made a mistake, Brother...I just want to." Jazhea despaired to make Ren believe her words.

"Jazhea, I know this is important, but we can talk about this lat-" Ren pried his search back at the pursuing trouble. The Maelstrom lurched forward, but then halted.

"That, mistake, almost cost us our lives! By Daven's blade, Ren, if I were you I'd toss that wretched kreld-eating sack of...but I'm not. Your sister took us into too much trouble-sure, but by the Blood of the Twin Moons, it's Z.M.Q.! Do you know how feared those three letters are?! You never, ever, try to find out what happens at 4-1-9 Janda-town and if we let her free, she'll take us there!" Ioz was provoked into further insecurity by the reminder of that signature, he swerved from the jitters. "Chungo lungo! Jitatan sea-pigs!" The rugged seafarer at the wheel cursed and cultivated a pervading turn, the tailing Maelstrom had begun to retreat. The Wraith scarcely dodged what developed to be a short-fallen catapult shot.

"We can't do that! Ioz, are you saying this Z.M.Q. is more threatening to us than Bloth? I can't see why you're behaving this way. Tula was the same when she joined us and you know she's not like that." Ren gracefully dismissed the nervy reaction.

"Ren, you weren't there when Tula and myself saw three of Bloth's on the Maelstrom trudge off when they caught a man they were going to give the dagron-bait, but they didn't! Why? Because he was bearing the mark of the evil Z.M.Q.! He places it on all of his slave pirates. This sea-weasel's...salamander-friend from Pandaawa City, the one we watched being thrown to the Constrictus while This One smiled..." He motioned to the frowning deceiver. "Delta, she let us in on Z.M.Q., he's trading Mantus one of the Treasures in exchange for a prisoner on Bloth's ship! I know just who Z.M.Q. called on for the Treasure-stealing job." Ioz pointed to her in vilifying accusation. The bateau had almost totally glided away from the tailing enemy ship and the sounds of bombardment and rushing waters had since subsided.

"Ay jitata, am I the only one who has any sense on this boat?! Ioz thinks not telling the rest of us about the reasons behind these bizarre pirate's tales are going to help us somehow, yet he needed to throw out our secret-weapon we could have used to escape from Bloth because of this Z.M.Q. business. I wouldn't doubt the greedy sea-pig was robbed by Z.M.Q." Tula intentionally paid either of them no mind after her sharp rile.

"And I wouldn't doubt the woman knows nothing of the dangers of speaking about Z.M.Q. on the High Seas of Mer! You never call Z.M.Q. anything but Z.M.Q...or there are grave consequences!" Ioz logically theorized as he watched out to the ocean, the heavy rains had long since seceded and the ship coasted from most of the clouds and bad winds. Tula scowled at him, but Ioz was reluctant to forgive or trust anyone who supposedly attempted neither to save or destroy their competitors.

"That's what you're going on, do slaves have a choice? If this Z.M.Q. is so horrendous then wouldn't doing anything to Jazhea only provoke more of a fire from him, especially if he regards her as property belonging only to him? I'll explain about Delta's use of the Constrictus lat-a seaquake!" Ren attempted to resolve the jumbled havoc as Ioz droned on in a sore grumble and stopped himself, though his meaning had been clear. The atmosphere began to shake.

"I know this current...! No!" Tula invigorated with a terrific cloud of peril gripping her function. Her forest irises shocked from a terrible evil, the rocks surrounding the peak of the abysmal falls peeked from an endless breadth below.

"Ren, let's go back to Pandaawa! There's nothing for us to eat, we're good as dead out here! I want to go back! Also, Joiquiva needs healing!" Niddler shrieked as he wiggled himself back on the scooping deck. He chattered with sullen protest. Bordering ledges of boulders plopped into foreign sea. The twin was knocked out of shape from the mishap, and ineptly left to sleep alone with her wound.

"Ren, take the wheel! Chungo lungo, the Maalagar Current of Discord! I knew Bloth was turning back for a reason! I told you!" The hostile buccaneer's scream disappeared into a unyielding wind as the Wraith achieved an impossible dive into the nether beyond. The waterfall tipped the hull and everything with it into a barren void.

"Ok, I think we can say that now." When the perpetually dooming drop had passed Ren sighed into the pitiless darkness.

"Chungo-lungo! One jitatan thing after another!" The ever pessimist, Ioz, continued to complain about anything.

"I wanted to go to the Wing-Ball-Banquet!" Niddler chimed his desire.

"Ay jitata, someone light a torch already." Tula frazzled of exhaustion.

"I would if I could see where the cindersand is. Kree have poor eyesight." Xiluk declared his eagerness to lend a hand but only counteracted his zeal by knocking himself on a blunt protrusion. Someone tripped through the gloom.

"Wonderful for you. Xiluk, at least you could have made a home for yourself in the highest mountains. It's untold how many flights I have left before my eyes become permanently unusable, I don't even have my home in Northern Octopon now because Vaecusa took all the gold when she disappeared so I was forced to leave, until I was taken two months ago in Kalinda." Jazhea's spite quavered at the boy, a covetous displeasure apparently finding root.

"Two months ago?! That means when I stumbled into Solia. Did you lie about anything else, shardfish? I bet the dagron wasn't hers! The kreld-eater probably trained her to do what she did!" Ioz's hassling afflicted the strife-ridden mood.

"I guess so. I've been near dragons myself since I was five years old and they follow me! I lost my own after I set out long ago! Beesall was mine but I didn't train her, she just listened to me. I was stranded for a long time on Kalinda island where Bloth trapped me. Beesall caught my attention so I took her as my own...she was carrying a piece of something glimmering on her mane." The braided thief retorted with an explanation.

"Which means she was Bloth's, you lying sea-snake!" Ioz shouted at Jazhea from the wheel, his mind burned. Now he could only focus on her disastrous betrayal and nothing else.

"Something glimmering?" Ren was in the midst of forming a theory on the troublemaker's account, but it quickly slipped away. "Ah, there we are! The current is gone, we can stop fighting now." He clinked together two stones into a stake filled with a powdery dust. The flare sizzled into life to reveal the Wraith stationary in deepened ducts far below the brink of the heavens. The keel was fixed on a immovable structure.

"Ren, we need to get out of here...if we are where I think, we'll be in trouble soon..." Tula leaned against Ren, whispering to collect his attention. He showed her an observant eye and nodded.

"If you would have been so polite to let me finish, she got us caught in a net because of her eating habits. It was one set for another crew, and after that everything went...down a waterfall." Jazhea lamented mournfully, outwardly pouting.

"You've brought us nothing but trouble, we wouldn't have even been in jeopardy. I don't care about your jitatan dagron, consider not being a back-stabber for once in your life and tell the truth or we're leaving you here!" Ioz threateningly rebuked. In his mind he would have liked to rip the cheat-of-a-lying-con apart, he could not help but feel wrath for his allies who would have been in an inescapable position, in the least. He mused in retrospective, it maybe had been well he stayed on the Wraith to the aid his comrades instead.

"Enough!" Ren yelled out, wishing to gain some kind of leverage in the argument.

"Hey! Don't think I didn't help you out at all, chunga-lungan naja-dog!" Jazhea challenged the sailor who had been steering the ship. After vacillating her attention to realize that danger had gone, she reached into a pocket inside her frock and thrust a scroll on the floor. "Look at that! That dartha-eel of a pirate-captain is somehow tailing you! I risked my shabby neck to get it for you!" The chaotic femme wrought, the crew peeked at her with suspicion and eyes flurried up. She huffed, crossing her arms.

"Watch your mouth, woman! Ren might be the Captain here and you might be his sister but that won't stop me from tossing you overboard if you try anything!" Ioz warned as he trekked down from the wheel. "Chungo lungo, don't believe anything she says! I wouldn't be surprised if this isn't some new trick that leviathan sea-scum thought up! The map is probably a fake!" He stayed edgy, still stewing over all he had gone through and getting into a tussle again with the golden-haired trickster. He glimpsed to the object under her chin. "I say we take back what she stole!" He swiftly demanded, taking note of something he hadn't before.

"I didn't steal anything! If I wanted to try something I would have by now!" Jazhea noisily cut in.

"Where did she get that?!" Ioz bristled, he pointed to the polished flat of stone and gold chained about her neck.

"Back off, pirate! This is truthfully mine!" Jazhea instantly raised in pitch. She protected her wealth that was heavier than the average friendship-keepsake, clapping hands over the gold-leafed trinket. "It was given to me by my cousin, and she got it from her father when they went on vacation! I never take it off!" She proclaimed with an assured boldness. After covering her mouth, her throat rippled with a ghastly noise.

"It's fully yours, Jazhea?" Ren doubtfully inquired.

"Of course! Fully." Jazhea mightily argued with an acceding nod.

"Of course because the landlubber says it, it makes it so. Only a half-masted wench serves Z.M.Q." Ioz muddled behind visibility. "If that fancy necklace she's wearing is hers then Liege-Mizzen Conquest of the Maelstrom is forging Z.M.Q.'s blood-plunder for a price, Mantus, the greedy jewelry-trader. I'm sure he is rolling in gold from imitations of treasured Ruukaana, but not even he deserves the leviathan's jaw for making crooked deals with Mer's most notorious card shark." Ioz fondled his own necklace containing an identical gemstone, which was lengthwise sliced-in-half.

"That's enough. This conflict is over." Ren reconciled further.

"Look at the map." The ambitious princess implored. Ren let out a frustrated sigh.

"Stop it." Ren exhorted once. "Jazhea, I'm not certain I should...what you did was still very bad-" He served a notion to talk but had been abruptly finished up by the estranged sister appealing to him again.

"Look at it, Ren!" Jazhea practically screeched at him. Ioz glared exceedingly, as if his temper had been about to boil over once more. "You don't understand! I've seen enough adventures with Bloth and...Bloth's scariest. I'm not any seadog of Z.M.Q.'s bilge-rats either! At least by choice." She trembled inordinately.

Ren only stared at her with eyes narrowed, not knowing whether he should oblige her or not.

"Just look at it." The softened dame pleaded over, now more settled. Ren frowned with a grueling gaze, knowing this would be a long trip. He was not fully trusting but he bent to pick up the parchment as he kept eyes on her.

Ren cautiously raised the map and unrolled it. In terror, he scrutinized everything written on it. He viewed five large X's scribbled in places, two of which were smudged at the exact spots he had previously voyaged to collect the Treasures. The third location had not been marked off, possibly because by the time the Captain knew about the discovery of 11th Treasure Ren and his crew were already aboard the Maelstrom. He squinted at a few notes jotted down about the Treasures and the locations of such, some were in lucid handwriting. The few times the prince's name were written in that same precise scribble it had been harshly crossed off, as if someone were trying to eliminate him. Bloth's handwriting. Another scratchy and sloppily-written text marred the paper, smudgy in parts, and also about the whereabouts of the Treasures. The same spawned squiggle pertained to other ramblings about the dark water that would be interpreted as insane, he could not understand. In ink, The Dark Dweller was spelled out and something alleging to read Oracle In Gulf. He wrapped up the map, throughly disturbed. "How did you get this?" The regent's eyes had regained a worrisome aspect, he interrogated the girl across from him.

"Well he wanted me to infiltrate you so he let me into his quarters sometimes, I was there when I gave him your spiral and I noticed. It was in his war-room, and I was attacked by that scary...frail swordsman. The Commander! I was nearly killed." Jazhea woefully admitted.

"Do you mean, Mantus?" Tula pondered of the short dame, skewing her a strange glance. She descended from the net she had previously clawed up to scout around.

"Yes." Jazhea replied affirmatively to the ecomancer's query. Ren rolled this around in his head as the braided guest concentrated on him. For one instant, she could not talk or breathe and stripped her voice clean again.

"Why are you coughing?" Tula flat-out asked, this was not the first time the visitor had unleashed such a noise.

"I'm sorry. It's nothing serious, just...the bugs. It will be gone in a few days." Jazhea patiently told, not without a hint of meekness.

"A few days? I never knew Scarrot lasted for moons. It sounds like you're choking!" Tula's persevering senses flared up.

"Or dying from a plague. At least it's not contagious. Poor soul." Ioz verbalized a simmering alternative, his cringe tracing to a sympathetic whisper.

"But Mantus let me go because I remembered something my Instructor taught me. I tried to take his sword away from his hand while he was holding it-but I couldn't pick it up...! Honest!" Jazhea let slip another revelation, she was fully shaken up by this foolish and craven ambition.

"What the raffendi-why are you...so much of a smool-brained snag of windblown-gaff, you jitatan-idiot?" Ioz simply broke it down in words easily understood, though he was nearly exasperated himself at such craziness. "Well, what does the map say, Ren?" Ioz entreated tentatively from above as he tried to rush a clogged spindle. "Ren?" He badgered after, not receiving a response.

"I'll talk about it later. We need to figure out where we are and how to get out, the longer we stay down here the less of a chance we're going to have to find the next Treasure." Ren rapidly resolved Ioz's perplexity, not relaying many details.

"Ren, if I'm correct I think this is the Cape of Confusion, a sanctuary from Dark Water. I was here once when I was a girl, it's in the very dregs of Mer and it's extremely dangerous. We're very deep beneath the oceans, I heard from somewhere there is no wind this far down except for the breath of beasts sifted through tunnels from above and it's almost impossible to leave because we're sealed from the inside. Will that map at least guide us around?" She subjectively cautioned Ren as he again perused the new scroll.

"I'll bet the Maelstrom would starve down here." Ioz skimmed the stripped crater-formation with his squinting eyes. He could hear only drips of running rain, funneled from afar. The ground was solid and porous, but the Wraith was stationary on an unseen ledge.

"So will we!" Niddler chattered desolately in his solo woe, claws hugging to Tula's knee.

"It can't be completely sealed, or we wouldn't be breathing air. There's nothing on here marked Cape of Confusion." Ren prospected the shady chart. "Ioz, give the Wraith a heave and we should be able to move off this shelf. Clear the deck, I want everyone who is able to grab a rope and pull us forward. We'll search for a way out, maybe the Compass can guide the way if there's a Treasure down h-where is the 11th Treasure we just picked up?" His inflection sounded in alarm as he goggled around for any place it might have been left, he felt himself starting to fluster when he could not spot it.

"Niddler, the Treasure!" Ioz shouted abound, he expected the monkeybird to have it.

"I'll get it!" Niddler cawed and hastily flew back to where he had stowed the minga-melon rind and rushed to hand it over to Ioz. "Here!" He offered, extending the fruit skin to the buccaneer.

"That's not a Treasure! That's a jitatan minga-melon, monkeybird!" Ioz irritably felt himself beginning to become cross afresh as he swatted the fruit shell out of the monkeybird's hands.

"Yes it is, Ioz." Ren slyly corrected, his charming smile shone with a raised eyebrow as he fetched the rind and produced the scale embedded inside.

"Well, what do we know, we have our own monkeybird magician." Ioz quipped a fickle retort but he could not disguise the threshold of a smile on the curve of his mouth. Ren soundly laughed.

"Good job, Niddler." The kindly royalty commended the monkeybird and awarded him a friendly gleam. He motioned Ioz to recess from the helm, the brawny warrior moved into position behind the stern. "Now, let's move!" He leapt back to the controls as everyone jumped to gather lines and lash them to the many shelves along the bulwarks of the vessel. Xiluk passed a cord to Niddler, who in turn released it to Tula.

Niddler pranced about, proud of himself. He waddled over to a rope to assist with pulling the ship out of the rut. "This Quest is so tiresome without enough food to eat! By the moon-pair, I think that Treasure has more caloric value than what's here!" The ravening avian griped. He flew back at Ren's side. "Why can't we go back for minga-melons when we get out of here? I'm so hungry." He whined as Ren steadied the rudder to try to launch. Tula and Xiluk were laying more ropes off of the bow.

"Niddler, we just stopped not long ago. Don't you have any more below deck?" The sturdy lad at the wheel counseled the nagging monkeybird. Pandaawa had dissolved far in the distance before even boarding enemy headquarters, the crew had since fully stocked in supplies. He tilled the helm, he slightly loosened it but it still did not budge.

"No! Konk and his pirates were ransacking everything like darva-kreld!" Niddler complained, he trifled at Ren's side while letting his hunger overtake him.

"Here you go, Niddler." Tula signaled to him softly and ran up to him to deposit the gourd in his hands, which he ogled with pleasant delight. "I found it above the forepeak, though, I don't know what it was doing up there." She aired her intrigue and scouted with eyes for a time. She was quite captivated, but oddly. She scurried down to shove the hull with the combined efforts of Xiluk and herself. Niddler tugged in the space above.

"Are you pulling up there, woman? I can't-noy jitat!" Ioz's grunts and swears from the stern were growing louder but sounded of all things positive as the timber slipped past gravel and Ren's ahoy called them back from the channel. In that moment, Tula noticed the native with the gilded crest staring at her.

"You know, Xiluk. I was really surprised when you showed up with us." Tula's unfamiliarity was prompted with her vehemence as she climbed topside.

"Well, Tula." Xiluk approached the ecomancer. "I ran away from home to see you. You know the Kree and Ecomancers are alike in so many ways..." His breath became lucid as he diverted from the resting Jazhea and concentrated his pronounced absorption on Tula. He pressed a flaring-orange gemstone toward the ecomancer. "I want you to marr-" While Xiluk was anticipating his advance, a yell tore through the calm.

"Octarian Ox broad off port bow!" Ioz sent out the cry actively. Residing in the soused tunnels were not only the bull-brutes but reptiles with flat backs. Many were being ridden by spear-wielding hybrids of insect and human, each with an organic shield growing from it's back. The trio of beastly creations were attacking the ship with brunt and projectiles.

"Ohh...I don't like this at all!" Niddler yowled from displeasure as Ioz used the last minga-melon as protection against a shield-demon impaling the sail. The lifeforms were spilling from every corner now. The long-nosed crocozotes snapped their jaws and the eight-flippered oxen rammed their aquatic horns. On throbbing wings, the monkeybird twisted to avoid a propelled spear.

"Prepare for battle! Stay behind me, Tula!" Xiluk immediately shouted, he sidestepped to place himself in front of Tula and the dangerzone. Lashing back the strand of his longbow, he shot raining arrows upon every fiend he could find. Unfortunately, his efforts fell short because he failed to pierce the armor of the shield-demons and the gator hide of the crocozotes. The Octarian oxen merely submerged the points within their skin and back into the canal, taking no damage. "By Krulakot!" He bit his trammeled terror, a spear clanked the golden bangle on his arm.

"Wait! I think I know why they're attacking us, they think we're trying to take their Light Orb!" Tula cut in, amplifying herself enough to be heard through the combat.

"Light orb?" Ren strove to press out his urgency for a quick explanation. He smacked a resilient anthropod, but his dulled half-blade did no benefit against the resilient exoskeleton of the foe. He clasped the compass. "A Treasure? Noy jitat!" He would have investigated what he saw to be a flashing pulse further, were he not taken down on his rear.

"There's an orb of light these monsters in the Cape of Confusion worship, I saw someone do it once before on the ship I grew up on! If we can take it from it's placement I think we can control them, but we need to find out where it is!" Tula resolved to use her senses to the location of the gleam. "That way!" She ambitiously announced a concealed neck of the damp cavern from where a faint flicker was emanating.

"How are we going to get there? These sea-slugs won't let us pass and we lost the Wraith's only scout in that jitatan monsoon!" Ioz breathlessly jabbed at a cretin with his slivering blade, only to be reeling over against the very railing he fought it from.

"We can use one of the crocozotes to row down the creak! Their backs are flat enough, I can direct them ecomantically but I would need someone to slow the droves down in case they come after us!" The ecomancer yelped as a ox smashed against the ledge and threw her to the floor.

"Then you need m-" Xiluk sprinted for Tula to claim his placement but Ioz swooped her up beforehand.

"Sorry, lad. We need your talents here! Chungo lungo!" Ioz exclaimed in the heat of diving off the bridge with Tula and before Xiluk could insist otherwise. The two were flung atop the spine of a toothy reptile. "Hurry up, Tula, those shell-rats will sink us and ruin our repairs." He adjusted himself on the scaly mesh, handling the fins on either side as paddles. He peeked to the reverse assault on the Wraith's weak hull and then to the woman driving their transport. He slashed at the charging oxen and the giant water-eels shooting over his head. The femme incited the creature as briskly as her aptness would allow.

"Just need to feel light's movements..." Tula roused the crocodilian to swim ahead while Ioz rowed the fins. She was pouring her connection into the animal's sense of direction. Her vision became halcyon, swerving through the water. She wove and cycled in the stagnant inner-sanctum and as her eyes were allowed to open, she set upon a soft-blue light in her point. "It's there!" Tula arose to reveal the safeguarded salvation, she flagged with her arm. Ioz jumped the back, defending against what looked to be a carnivorous dragonfly before pilfering the pearl and remounting. Tula and Ioz settled to return but to their astonishment, swarms of the burrow dwellers washed them back to the Wraith just as it was being taken over.

"The magical light that controls the shield-demons and their beasts?" Niddler squawked, greeting the arrival of Tula and Ioz. The crocozote that had nearly snapped his tail off relinquished it's hold. The shield-demons and the crocozotes dunked under the Wraith and carried them through the caves with the Octarian oxen bearing the stern.

"This light is no Treasure of Rule but it saved us." Ren admired the glowing orb of white-blue as every creation lauded. The gratification was short-lived however, as the adventurers soon found themselves placed on the ridge Ioz had stolen from.

"Ren, what now? There's no wind in this section of the cavern. We could be stuck forever down here." Ioz searched with a forsaken nerve overtaking. Placid droplets merely sprinkled through the concentrated basin of the endless canals. The enlarged crew was silent as all awaited some indication.

"I'll tell you what we do, we can set up camp here. We still have enough cindersand to warm us for one more night at least. Besides, I think this pearl should give us plenty of light." In the heat of the dilemma Ren tactically proposed to lodge on the moated surface. Ioz and Tula were in unsettled humor, but let down the anchor.

"Why does it always have to be like this? We haven't eaten in forever. This Quest isn't worth all the decadence we get at port..." Niddler hovered to perch on the only available border, pathetically groaning.

"Don't you think I'm hungry too? I do wonder why our food stock is completely gone but we can worry about finding food after we rest for the night. Do you think I would let us starve to death, Niddler?" Ren quickened into action, beginning to unload and heft away materials for the excursion.

"You have before..." The sorrowed avian whined uncomfortably.

"Must have been that seastorm, the way the wind was blowing I wouldn't doubt if a lot of our supply was tossed." Ioz reasonably deduced as he scoped upon the complex tunnel-system. The whole dominion was laid out like a massive underground-aqueduct, or an abandoned mine. Tula just replied with a word of maybe.

"I can see if anything is missing below." Xiluk suggested, trying to assuage the process.

"We'll take stock later. For now we have to make our way through this night, and hopefully to port." Ren dismissed Xiluk of responsibility, only asking him to dock the remaining berths. Everything necessary was cleared and the base was settled on by seven misfits. The light orb was defended by Ren throughout the evening. Tula sat between Ren and Ioz as she examined the peculiar scene across from her, Xiluk continued to gawk at her while Jazhea was changing the bandage herself. Both of their backs were turned against each other. Far roars of uncanny wildlife still vibrated along the chilly terrain.

"Long day? I can tell you're either bumming around in taverns or being attacked by monsters when you're not being abducted by Bloth." Jazhea shifted her legs to join the circle as she attempted weak sight, at last taking the advice to rest.

"That's our life looking for these Treasures, get used to it." The tenacious rogue agreed with little more than a grunt. Ioz kicked a dust particle into the blazing fire.

"Nothing will stop us from putting an end to the dark water. Jazhea, you said something earlier about a woman who can move dark water? Why didn't you say anything like this before?" Ren effected to finally acquire some solacing reason behind the whole wreck.

"How was I supposed to trust you? You didn't trust me, I didn't believe you were who you said until you almost lost your life over it. I'll tell you everything I know about it if all of you promise you'll tell me anything you find out about Vaecusa, and who was to be my suitor." Jazhea offered her trust.

"It's a deal." Tula accepted for all.

"Before Bloth found out about KPrince Primus's plans for the Quest, the pirating nation of Valjen was home to the true enemies of Octopon's throne. They spared the city no quarter during their raids, even after it raised the white flag. Our older brothers were taken from Jenna in the palace on their return ships from the city, as was Mizar's family and I. We were held at their homes for ransom. That was until a prisoner on the island, Saytasi of the Quiin dagron-riders intervened. Her brother had died by Bloth's men so she helped myself and cousin escape with Mizar, unfortunately in place of herself and Ren's older brothers to Sir Phorlock's vessel because KPrince Primus left us in his care if we were ever found. Two high-suns before I was captured in the aftermath of the Great Wave on Kalinda by Bloth's nets, I found Saytasi had survived and she was searching for her people. She told me of the story of the -haired woman who could move dark water. She only saw her once during a tragedy at sea, and the woman and her spectacle were never seen or heard from again." Jazhea tensely confided.

"I wonder..." Ren pondered over the curious claim but Jazhea seemed to only respond with a shrug of shoulders. "The Quiin dagron-riders, on Kalinda?" He favorably requested for her to continue.

"From Qui-Qua, they aren't like Bloth's. They're better at combat than many other Northern tribes and their culture is vastly different than our own. They rely on divining as a source of power." Jazhea summarized her wisdom swiftly. "One year after our Father's Quest, Bloth himself attacked Octopon the first time, but he failed and lost too many of his men in the Octopian seas. It damaged his reputation among pirates, only the roughest and coldest who harbored no affiliation to any would join him after that. I can tell you that isn't the case all the time, but sure as the twin moons it's important to keep it under wraps or you're a standing target for threats-not only from his other men, but from Z.M.Q." The mild company finished her recount with a cough.

"No wonder Bloth was in trouble. I was there when Konk didn't know how to use a telescope." Ioz pensively laced his fingers as he listened and speculated.

"Jazhea, I have one question. Was it you who Lus-nayi and Joiquiva said Bloth was bent on hunting down?" Tula aired the curious bother she had been meaning to ask, the Pirate Lord was seriously determined to find someone when he commited that atrocious act.

"No, that was someone else. Bloth wouldn't waste his time for me. If anything, I would only be a valuable source of rumors. Not that I know many secrets, barely was I allowed to walk freely. I do know the winner of a brawl on the Maelstrom decides the final fate of the loser. Their means of control is to overpower, I lost too many battles. Mantus and Bloth however, have never been questioned beyond what was a matter of life and death. The Squadron Master tried to break my will by using the one thing I was afraid of...he would have taken me back to my former Master..." Jazhea quietly concealed her misaimed eyes in the point of Tula.

"Jazhea, if you would, we would be interested in knowing who or what this Z.M.Q. is." Tula centralized her focus on the opposite woman, at last seeking word from someone who may tell her.

"That's two. It is both an easy and a hard question, Tula. Easy, if you want to know he is the second and only Pirate Lord to rival Bloth in force and fear. Hard, if you want to know who is behind those three letters. He's the Prince of Pirate Thieves. No one has seen or heard from the man behind the anonymous attacks represented by the Z.M.Q. sigil or the legion behind his power. Not even I have seen his face. The mark on my shoulder only serves to represent my servitude, I tried to say this earlier." Jazhea conceded to recount any inside understanding, but drew a blank at the overly extensive idea.

"What about Mantus or Bloth's men? Delta told us Liege Mizzen-Conquest made a trade with Z.M.Q., a slave for a Treasure of Rule." Ren readily discussed another manner of unrest.

"Because if any man knew who Z.M.Q. was, they would slay him faster than a leviathan takes to shower." Ioz assumed unwaveringly. "Delta did mention Z.M.Q., if you can take her for her word." He envisioned his encounter with the patron off the coast of Pandaawa, prior to her entrapment. The temptress had softly breathed the lore into his ear in exchange for his fair treatment of her...and her apparent bonding with him. He had thought of her as such a quirky female, at the time.

"Correct. I would not believe everything said by Delta should be taken seriously. I know nothing of Mantus receiving any Treasure of Rule, the only Treasure I know Bloth and his men encountered without your knowledge was the one I stole from you. Z.M.Q. has a way of repaying those loyal to him, but I doubt Bloth is it. His men can't stand Z.M.Q., he threatens them and their tribes constantly. Many ships have sunk because of Z.M.Q.'s retribution and the only reason they listen is because they are very afraid of him. If Bloth didn't pay the occasional penance, they would find themselves a new captain. The Polar Prince is rival to both Z.M.Q. and Bloth, no one has knows him by any connection other than a selected proxy. Supposedly, he has the power of black-ecomancy, used through thievery to exploit Z.M.Q.'s surplus weakness, but as far as we know, he's even less of a reality than Z.M.Q. is." Jazhea expressed a privy blockade to her support, finding the sole fables to be the only basis for her advice.

"Jazhea, you were forced to work for Z.M.Q., so does that mean you were a slave like I was when I worked for Bloth?" Niddler gathered by Jazhea, sharing a proverbial acquaintance. The lady nimbly combed the furry head.

"Different." Jazhea acknowledged her position very covertly, smiling at the monkeybird. "On the Day of Fire, twelve years ago my guardian, Sir Phorlock, received an invitation letter to the Moonsail festival claiming to be from the remnants of Octopon's royal family, but it was a trap set by Bloth to lure anyone who knew King Primus to Octopon so he could capture the Treasures of Rule and slaughter those who weren't of any use to him. His threats did not work for those who stood against him and in his rage, he burned our beautiful city down. Sir Phorlock evacuated Vaecusa and her youngest child, Loren. I traveled with them to Meridol in Northern Octopon, where I lived until Vaecusa's disappearance four years ago. Unfortunately Sir Phorlock suffered with his life, but Loren and I suffered with the purple mist." Jazhea evenly sighed as she concluded.

"Loren? Mizar's son?" Ren edged for further detail. He remembered meeting Loren only once, under Arakna island where Avagon had been washed ashore. Twice, counting the time when the youthful study had delivered him the map of the River of Rule and before Ren and Niddler were aware of who he was.

"Aye, he is. The most devoted of their children, very he was to Captain Mizar's role in our father's Quest. He would always study into the night. Vaecusa disappeared during the time he was away at study and Mizar gone, but I saw no reason for him to be involved regardless." Jazhea casually disclosed, not indicating a trace of doubt. "Hey, if you really want to have success on your Quest, why don't you find the Sun and have him marry Lady Luck?" She proposed a new assessment.

"Lady Luck is just a legend for winning big, no one has ever married Lady Luck." Ioz scoffed at the visitor's chatter.

"Wouldn't you like to try? Qui-Qua pirate's tales are different. Lady Luck was the house-maiden to the Shining One and whoever marries her is destined for victory. As the tale goes, she was preparing to marry the Sun, but instead she was brought by the winds to marry the Prince of the Arctic Mountains and the world was encased in everlasting Darkness. Don't you want to give up all this struggle as soon as possible?" Jazhea eagerly foretold with a twitch under her cheek. She gazed back to where Xiluk was, a length away. The Kree native was shortening his angle toward Tula.

"I'm afraid the Treasures of Rule are the only legend that can help us, and much a better one than any lore or sea-fable." The spooky peace broke when Ren stirred from his placement on the ground after showing the relation a distant nod. He stepped over to the blaze to kick in another tinder-log. The Compass was peculiarly glinting, but it would not glow. Ioz was immersed in watching Ren tinker with the token and Xiluk hustle to Tula. The swashbuckler's gloomy eyes narrowed.

"Then you are braver than I. Aye, it is just a legend. Every Quest ends at Octopon, as the Sun rises of course." Jazhea nonchalantly shrugged. Ren trot in a serpentine, becoming engrossed in his own dealings.

Joiquiva dissolved to fatigue, it wasn't the same without her sister there. The spotty picture of her bright red eyes were an indefectible reminder of the sodality she missed. For this Joiquiva might have been inspired to give up on the Guyfoo Capsule and join Ren's crew for the rest of the way, these strangers had become family. Her ties to Lus-nayi abode with monumental lamentations.

"Joiquiva, this isn't the last time our winds will cross with the Maelstrom. If your sister is anything as smart as you say she'll hang on for as long as she needs to." Ioz realized a reputable peace with the delicate merling.

"How do you know they won't kill her?" Joiquiva was crumbled by a crippling pang as she curled on weary feet.

"Bloth is the scum of the seas but he knows what is valuable." Ioz had held up the mended sail prior to their exchange. She could only pray Lus-nayi's talent was known.

"Tula, why won't you consider coming away with me? Am I not hansom enough?" Xiluk slid in next to the ecomancer, dejectedly seeking an explanation for his rejection. Tula nervously evaded and only seemed to be more elusive.

"No, it's not that at all. I have to help Ren and Ioz finish the Quest, you have to understand. I like you, Xiluk, but just because I'm an Ecomancer and you're a Kree doesn't mean we can be together." Tula attempted to gain any compromise to console the pain in her friend but Xiluk only developed a sadder appeal.

"Then I want to join you on your Quest. Please?" With a pronounced oath Xiluk moved closer. His affectionate browns softly blinked and then his face bordered on her own and readied to enjoin.

"Regrettably, we don't have enough stock for a new addition." Ioz cleared his throat and aptly shifted so Tula could move over, granting Xiluk a cold scour. Except there were seven, missing Lus-nayi. Xiluk immediately drew away and rotated back to his seat. Tula responsively followed his snub with her clarion view. "Ren, what are you doing?" The resting pirate lashed his head to the left to witness Ren stalking around in a circle with his boots, musing on the Compass laid out in his palm. Niddler was one-shard merry walking in the regal's shadow.

"The Compass is leading somewhere...but I can't tell." Ren acknowledged the brilliant gemstone that appeared to be doing no more than leading him around in a continuous circle.

"This is called the Cape of Confusion, right? Could this be some kind of illusion?" From the caboose of the campaign Niddler suggested. Ren wasn't in a complete agreement, but would soon have to silence his enthusiasm. Silence blew through the lonely domain as the travelers all lost energy to remain awake any longer. Ren and Tula succumbed, Ioz ensued soon after with a too-hungry Niddler. Last, but not least, Jazhea dropped an erratic mind. All fell and were heavily dozing in the cavern, except for one.

"Farewell, my sweet princess." Xiluk rose from a crumpled ruse, his sigh hushed bleakly. The heartbroken adolescent leaned on knee to bestow the beautiful Andorian a first and final kiss. Tula did not stir as he left.

The smile of a goddess and a sorcerer touched a tender face with a kiss. Tula walked through a grove in the dark. No people or beasts were beside the rushing river. Sparks of a natural wonder flashed for a brief spell, until it became too much. She could only see herself somewhere unfamiliar, where destitution and carnage were all that prevailed. The stranger with hair like a rose gave her a test of trust and sent her on her way. Tula reemerged, coddled by a wounded warrior from a land so born of rife. Yet in her eyes she saw kindness, and a true birth on the living ship.

Untold time passed and the youthful ecomancer awoke to a crackle of fire. Tula's forest sight perused the mat she had reclined on to eventually lose consciousness. The red glare of the pyre was almost to a demise so she clunked in another board from the pile. She had only stretched to a sitting when she sensed a unique blare of color and a sound. To her nigh discernment, the Compass was going off from about Ren's neckline. It was flashing and fading, making a humble chime as it did so. She undid the tie from the prince, placing the finder on her own. She was in between her two companions. Ren was so tired that he did not even flinch when she took his artifact, even Ioz was sleeping like a baby. It was a good thing in that moment she was not Bloth. In her stunned discovery, the noise only became louder when she touched it. On slow boots, she pursued the source. The alcove she entered exhaled a blue aura. She footed to what the Compass was motioning to, a rectangular monument. Feeling compelled to kneel before it, she touched the gravestone. "Sugii." She breathed the name written, and a veil of gossamer overhead revealed an olive woman with tied tresses of sable. Sugii protected this dwelling of life from obliteration many moons ago. Tula's tears dripped to the stone while the spirit abandoned her.

"Do you need more time?" Tula reversed at a tread behind her, Ren patiently remained.

"It was Sugii. She gave me something...in my heart." Tula shuffled forward, reaching him with an endearing murmur. The Compass ceased to burn, definitely solaced to reaction by the evacuation of Sugii's spirit. No Treasure was here.

"What a supreme beauty she was." The sturdy onlooker praised. The ecomancer was surprised to see Ioz was also supporting her as she embraced him as well. Tula strode out of the crypt between both her friends, returning to the campground.

"Where's Xiluk?" Beyond worldly senses, Tula questioned the mysterious disappearance of the admirer. Niddler and Jazhea were both asleep where they had laid their heads. Ren and Ioz were behind her. Xiluk was gone, and she had known it was not for any favorable reason. "We have to find him, now!" She rushed into action, gathering a sack of supplies from the flat. The sleeping scouts awoke in a frenzy.

"But Tula, there's no wind. We're becalmed right now. How will we reach him? He's not here anywhere." Ioz was beset by the obstruction to the idea.

"No, wait. There is, look!" Tula pointed to a current flowing behind the tethered Wraith and the remains of a battered raft. "The winds must be blocked by one the channels at a certain moontide, which means we can find out where he went if we hurry!" She motioned the gaping witnesses to the blustering air, blowing visibly leeward. Agreement from the remaining six soon came. Ren and Ioz made the ship ready to sail to wherever the breeze would take her.

"Where do you think he ran to, Tula?" Jazhea nervously yawed for a guess. She fiddled with her sweating hands, remorse set in languidly.

"I can't say exactly, but I promise we're going to find him. I just kno-" Tula started to console the straining colleague, but stopped at a impulse. She tapped her palm on the ledge of the Wraith, experiencing a hum as she did so. Her green eyes opened with a new burst of sensitivity. The dusky-haired child she saw in her vision was lulled to sleep by the rocking of waves, a wonderful sparkle encircled her. "The carvings...they make sense to me!...It's wisdom from Sugii!" White ripples pulsed from Tula's hands when her spirit flared into a shock of intensity at this memory. Without any manual movement, the sails lifted. The curse from Ioz flung louder in her ears than it would if she were not transfixed, the wheel moved of the force's accord. The gears switched faster than possible by man as she witnessed the tacking craft following the trail in a melody of harmony strung about the waterpath.

"Now she's ecomancing the Wraith! Amazing, Tula!" From the bow Ren excitedly laughed as he gloried in Tula's handiwork, not a single halyard needed to be fixed and not one sail needed to be trimmed.

"You're doing it, woman! You're doing it, Tula!" Ioz jumped from the self-steering helm, chuckling heartily. He admired the gorgeous sorceress from his post, grinning with more fondness than he ever had before.

"By the Trust of Myelkah and Toishuok, the Lifeblood of the North, I wield your vitality to earn the Love of your creation!" Tula was falling feeble before her eyes were forced back open at a shock. She hearkened the desperate yell vibrating in her ears, somewhere on the shoal of the abutting turf.

"Stop!" The seer screamed quickly. Every passenger on the Wraith made preparations to embark.

PART The Living Ship

"Xiluk!" Jazhea sprinted forward, catching the Kree prince on his final summon. Her lips embraced the crestfallen youth, stopping him in a warm crush. Tears stained the lad's cheeks. "Your hair is rust, stop this!" One more labored breath and he was still.

"These geysers, why was he attacking them? Or rather, attracting them?" Tula bolted to the attentive girl, spinning around to observe the explosive fumes erupting from the jagged pits.

"He was trying to..." Jazhea's voice unusually creaked, she was crying. "Tula, he can only ask his gods for a limited number of power boosts before he dies. How many have you used, Xiluk?" She shed tears into his short mane.

"55 Soul Storms. I had already used 21." Xiluk ashamedly confessed from hugging Jazhea. Xiluk would ride to his return home from his Quest for Mer as the men of his village would praise his chariot with the savior Ecomancer by his side, then and only then would the love of his life be forced to acknowledge his might.

"That means you only have One left! Oh, Xiluk...Let me explain something, Tula." Jazhea was allayed in the simple comfort of her friend.

"It was my overture to the gods of my village and my soul is bound to this scythe, thus I am one of the Defenders of my people." Xiluk softly explained. Tula could understand the disharmony of the pair.

"I saved her life when our homes were closer together, Jazhea was about to be robbed by thieves when she was away from her first dagron but I was able to fire some shots to let her escape. Then my soul became bound to my scythe because I earned the price of honor among our five gods, Kuunda, Tarogyn, Bisterptock, Myelkah and Toishuok. Our Soul Song is a last act that uses all the blessings we have in our hearts. Sheelia's Devotion Song did so to save my grandfather. Iskjar has a long life ahead of him because his life is golden, a boost given to him by his selfless daughter, my mother, Supreme Kree Sheelia. My Soul Song is reduced." Xiluk focused on the ecomancer to tell his own story, a newly bronzed whip of hair now dipped over his ashen eyes. "I'm sorry, Tula. I didn't want to face up to what was really troubling me so I used you as an excuse. I was afraid to face Jazhea because she can be so mean..." With eyes lowered he regret his brash actions.

"I'm so sorry! Please don't do it again!" Jazhea apologized devotedly, not letting him go. Xiluk maintained his hold, not reaching any easement despite his blushing hope. "I helped Xiluk from being eaten by a pack of Pah-leopards when he misplaced his Soul Scythe, I went to Iskjar and he summoned the rest of the community to drive them out." Jazhea reflected completely as if trials from years ago had all happened in the immediate. She sniffled as woe touched her every impulse, and she didn't let him go.

"Xiluk. If I give you a kiss, will you promise to prevail for Jazhea, and all your friends?" Jazhea let go of an auspicious Xiluk when Tula approached, clearing way for the heroine. When he shyly nodded she placed a tender peck on his lips.

"You helped me realize that I was only running away instead of righting what I truly needed to. Thank you, Tula." Xiluk happily smiled with a newfound gratitude.

"She told him to take his hands off and was told to run. Unfortunately, she was still trapped..." Joiquiva was breathless when her twin could be signaled.

"Kuunda...Ayi yoira toivak." No trace of fight remained on the limp body of Lus-nayi, scratched and sore with only a broad leaf to cover her shame. Delta had been beaten down with worse injuries than before that single-woman mutiny.

Ren felt a sad grief when he knelt down with her. "What did she say?" Niddler pleaded to be sure.

"Kuunda, I'm happy to be alive." Eight explorers boarded the ship to search for a route out of the underground bay.

"I feel where this wind is taking us...to the air-drift." Tula directed the convoy forward on the return venture, delighted that she had helped Xiluk and Jazhea relay their dissonance.

"There's enough food to take us home!" Niddler indulged in the many fish that splatted to the deck. Nets were cast by Ren and Ioz, Xiluk shot arrows and Jazhea swung rope. The entire accumulation amounted to more than would be easily hunted on their path through the ocean. The drift steered the hull to an updraft only wide enough for the smaller of ships, but the Wraith was the right size to float up and out of the depths.

The Wraith cruised astray of what washed by, a hollow plank inscribed with the markings of three letters.

"Let's take you home, Xiluk. Then we can be sure we've done everything by far to help the Imbibers, they still need to be freed." Ren peered at the Compass glinting in the morning radiance, beaconing the path to the road ahead.

"Thank you, Ren, but that won't be necessary. I would like to return to my home but I think I can manage to find my way back, and like your pirate friend said, you don't have enough supplies for a newcomer. We are excellent trackers, I will do well to journey from Octopon." Xiluk bowed with a splendor in his pitch.

"Ren, I mean that I'm sorry for what I did, but I didn't want to lose. It was my fault, I deliberately ignored everything Vaecusa had warned me about. I knew Bloth sailed in a ship of bones and should I ever see it to run. I only got myself into a jam when I thought I could use him with my name. Then I was in over my head, and a mere travesty to him. Our family is gone, there's nothing for me to look back or ahead to." Jazhea desolately confessed, and her incentive became like ice. "Let me join you, I want to get back at him. Please." The maiden digressed to the surrounding triad with rigidity.

"First things, first. You have to ask Ren." Tula asserted as she hopped ahead to where the others gathered.

"Ask Ren, he's the Captain here." Ioz mumbled, pendulating the wheel. His ire toward the woman had transparently subsided but he did not hint to be in much of a mood, he contrarily seemed bothered.

"You're strange, Ioz, you just wanted to kill me not long ago." Jazhea remarked rather impertinently.

"Sure to Kuunda I changed my mind. A token, of my appreciation. For Ren's kin. Come off it, woman." Ioz indolently shrugged off, verging attention away. Tula stared at him with a peaking enigma. In good spirits, he favorably ran after the orphans and laughed as they hid rock-clams instead of rolling minga-melons.

"I'm sorry, Jazhea. We will drop you off when we arrive at port but I don't think it's a good idea to come with us anymore, I know how you feel about our family but it would be too dangerous for both of us. Imagine what would have happened if we weren't there to help you. You have to know we're not on this Quest for revenge, and Bloth is too powerful of an enemy to be defeated by one woman. Not even we can take him down, Jazhea, and I've been following my Father's Quest for over a year now." Ren did what he needed to, Tula ruminated about a notion from about his standing. "Besides, look at you, you're sick. I'm sure Jenna will know how to fix you up." Ren signaled to her ill condition with more than a latent twinge. She was coughing turbulently when she had done so, but otherwise looked fine.

"Tula, I really wish you'll visit me sometime, if you can." Xiluk roamed over beside Tula to address her modestly. She nodded her head.

"Of course I will." Tula affirmed as they paced along the sidelines. "After we stop the dark water from taking over Mer, I'll come visit you. Remember your promise, Xiluk." She wholeheartedly affirmed her faith in her new confidant. Xiluk vowed on his heart.

"It's really nothing I can't handle, I really have nothing to lose, and you'll be a King. Please? I want to spend my remaining time doing to help the world...I won't go back to Bloth again, I never wanted to join him to begin with." Jazhea denied the ailment, she did not concern herself despite the worriment of Ren and Tula. Xiluk pried his eyes to a cubby where Niddler was rooting and peeling back a plank on the Wraith's cabin-sedge.

"Jazhea, why does it really matter if Ren is going to be King?" Once more, Tula conspicuously wondered as she bent her neck. Niddler squawked, browsing a poorly camouflaged tube. His wings rumpled as he squalled into a freak-out.

"Kings are at the top of the food chain. Princess aren't as important." Jazhea cheerlessly rationalized.

"Kings are responsible for everyone, even princesses like yourself, and it's not easy to be a leader. Every people and species of Mer deserves to live freely and safely. That's what Good Kings are there for. Just because you're not traveling with us doesn't mean you're not of any help, there are many things Mer needs. Our home city Octopon needs more food and medicine, something I'm not able to help with but I think you might be. You need to find your true purpose." Ren consoled the fragile sibling before him, leading her back to a sheltered placement.

"This is all very touching but I think we could use a plan for the trail ahead, while you were playing life-coach the dark water came back. Not to mention, a path out of these doldrums. Niddler!" Ioz hollered aloud to the fatiguing monkeybird on duty, the breeze was scantly tapering off. "If I'm correct these tradewinds will take us straight to Octopon." He pronounced his inclination.

"And if I'm correct, they will take us too far East." Tula bit her lip as she argued accurately. Ioz winced his face at her, but couldn't hold it.

"Oh stop fighting already!" Niddler squawked as he chomped on a partially roasted fish and peeked his mistrustful scan at a freed gizmo. Lus-nayi and Joiquiva ducked in his flurried fur. He demanded an eye.

"We'll be better off taking the slower course around the Meridian." Ren reposed from reassessing the newly-acquired nautical chart. He believed Jazhea about the map because he knew no other choice, but this new information was very troubling. Saddened and betrayed by Jazhea he previously had been, he did not think she made this up presently. She had never encountered Bloth before this time and he did think her to be similar to Cray with her attempts to manipulate evil for good, but this would not keep him from feeling disappointment. Though Ioz had let anger take over, his words had told what was right. "What is it, Niddler?" He whirled back at the avian, who was being considerably noisy.

"Nothing much, just Bloth left his telescope on our ship." Niddler shrugged and prolonged his beak-smacking.

"What?! That kreld-eater...how, and why?" Ren jumbled over while Tula and Ioz curled their weary squints at the overbearing eyeglass.

"I didn't place it here, I noticed it when I hitched a ride with your crew a while ago. I was still masquerading as Nimbo." Xiluk excused his role in rummaging for the handiwork as he edged the piece of reeded mirror-work to the hansom Octopian's palm. After confirming it was of the design of his nemesis, Ren placed it back as if it were another complication to his thought's plague. The heir drudged astray.

"Ren, you will really take care of all of us?" Jazhea timidly questioned, not revealing weakened eyes.

"Of course. Did you think I wouldn't do anything as King? You have to understand, I can't let you stay with us. Especially now when he knows things he didn't before." Ren courteously and unshakably phrased what would not be a wise decision in his leadership, especially when his heart was one of good and forgiveness. Jazhea appeared grieved by the news, but she nodded.

"Someone on this ship has a clear head! Now we can get back to finishing this Quest without being tricked and unnecessarily risking our lives! Ay chunga, now finally some fortune may come to us." Ioz relieved in something of exasperation when the problem had been solved and the Wraith skated away from a trying current, Jazhea examined him with shame and soberness. "Maybe even both kinds." He heightened moreover, greedily letting the hungering fallacy cart him off but for a moment. Then he resumed to an otherwise-appeased reality.

"No, Ioz, we have worse problems now." Ren heralded, he faced the pirate who continued to drive the ship into horizons beyond. "This map that she gave us, is troubling." He announced amid carrying the parchment up and surveying it once again.

"Great! That's exactly what I wanted to hear!" Ioz exclaimed with an unwelcome moan as his bubble burst, he smacked his hand to his head and just about face-palmed.

"What's really on that map, Ren?" Tula pried the leader of the company. With curiosity and sensibility, she walked over.

"Bloth knows where we're going." Ren's flat disclosure struck through the atmosphere like a starfishuriken. He glanced to Tula beside him and let her have a gander at the document, she responded with a gasp.

"But how? He doesn't have the Compass." Tula did not completely believe what her eyes were telling her, but it could not be denied. She just did not comprehend it.

"He doesn't. He's using some other way of tracking us." Ren stated, words stunted with nerve.

"Wait..." Tula engaged to conjecture again, she flashed back to the rendezvous on the Maelstrom. "The other person who was with Bloth...the disciple! It's Morpho!" She scrabbled to the shocking conclusion and blanketed her mouth with her hands in consternation. Ren blinked at her.

"Morpho?" Ren blanked out the name transiently, but then he remembered. Morpho, the ex-alchemist. Disciple of the Dark Dweller and the disturbing creature who invaded Octopon, turned home into a wreck. The same eyesore who recently tried to grapple him. Morpho, that Dark-Blood who had made Bloth the potion to forcibly trap his soul in the body of the archnemesis. He never wished to repeat that experiment again. "What does he have to do with this?" Ren pondered of his ecomancer friend, he perceived a kind of dread in her augury that she had not mentioned before.

"The jitatan fishface!" Ioz's stammer grunted with a tinge of enmity and tension.

"When we were on the Maelstrom, we overheard him talking to Bloth." Tula aptly began to explain it to Ren. "He said something like, the Ship is detected nearby. Detected, nearby." She emphasized of Morpho's words which were of course, referring to the Wraith. Ren paused to mull it over with a cap of his blond chin.

"How would he know?" Ren wondered thoughtfully. The deduction then moved him. "The dark water!" He yelled with realization to the outer stretch of muck as his eyes grew wide, the crew lobbed him nervous looks. "If that's true then this is..." He mused on his idea.

"Worse than we thought." Tula polished his reaction.

Ren bewared the progressing sea of bleak liquid outlining the course. The Compass illuminated to the South. "We'll need to stop on land soon. If we are where I think we are, we'll go straight to the lighthouse. We shouldn't be carrying too many of the Treasures with us, only one is needed to reroute through the dark water and from this map it should be en route to the next Treasure." He trumpeted as his spirit strengthened with fearlessness.

Two full moons arose in the barren sky by darkfall. The rough and ruddy hull of a petite ship sprayed by salty sea pulled to a rocky shore where a lighthouse was established. The overseer watching from a full pane high above swished to run down the spiraling stairs in haste.

The Captain of the wispy vessel and his shipmates scrambled to drop anchor and proceed to shore, the visitors carried by the crimson boat tagged along. Eight were greeted by an older woman with garnet tresses and decked in a covering shawl. "Ren! How have you been?" Jenna welcomed the prince, her surrogate son. She browsed the rest of the group, happy to note Ioz appeared well and much better from the last time she had seen him. "How is the crew faring?" She inquired softly and she motioned for them to come in. She noticed the two guests with them and had been about to say a word before Ren replied to her.

"We have been well, Jenna." Ren respectively made pleasantries, he leaned down to her beckoning arms to grant her a warm hug and he smiled. "We have Eleven of the Thirteen Treasures of Rule now, we only have two more remaining to be found." He stood up, Jenna seemed to be happy to hear the news he delivered.

"That is wonderful, Ren. Octopon has kept strength in these times of renewal, but it still only retains a portion of it's former glory." Jenna revealed, in result she was somber about this fact, as was Ren. Ren handed the 10th Treasure of Rule to her and the lighthousekeeper admired it with fascination. He showed her the 11th Treasure, but palmed it in his hand.

"Unfortunately we need to keep this to get through the dark water. It's worse than it's even been." Ren said lamentably of the situation, he pocketed the scale. Jazhea tousled one eye at Jenna, her peacock vision fluttered in tensity, but recognition.

"That does not surprise me." Jenna sedately actualized. "I have heard from many sailors who have tried to venture outside the borders of Octopon, and from what they have returned with, the seas are not even negotiable in some parts. I would not doubt if eight parts of the entire seas were covered by now." She morosely settled. "Who do you have with you, Ren?" Jenna meant to ask, she curiously peered at Jazhea who shined her a shy smile and Xiluk, who bowed his head. Something familiar pended with her, but it could not be placed.

Jenna's brow raised as her stunned tonality grew. "Jazhea, is it really you? I haven't seen you since you were a little girl, and Ren was only a baby. I heard you were..." Jenna was ostensibly disbelieving as she reached out a hand to smooth the girl's face, as if to see if her visitor could be real. Meanwhile, Niddler began chattering to Xiluk.

"Lost. Well, I have been away for a long time." Jazhea murmured competently, and with a dim falter. Ren felt uneasy about a entanglement unknown. "Oh, Xiluk. Here's something to take back to Iskjar. Tell him I'm sorry. Please let me know if you see my captain or Vaecusa, too." She returned her attention to the tall boy beside her. Upon a scribbling of ink she handed him off the letter that she handily composed.

"Of course. We'll see you on Kuunda's Night, I'll transfer the message." Xiluk nodded courteously, fastening to his sash the scroll he was passed. "Remember what I taught you Tula, turn-out in forth! Grace is an invaluable skill to have in a fight!" He tapped Tula on the shoulder, waving as he bid the remaining five goodbye.

"You can bet on it!" Tula positioned her feet so her adverse toes were pointing out, she bowed to the boarder who had taught her. She performed a finishing leap.

"Farewell, Xiluk. Let them know help is on the way! We'll return again sometime, very soon!" Ren placidly offered the fellow journeyer an indebted salutation. Xiluk's renewed devotion departed over the turf. "Anyway, Jenna, we were wondering if we could stay here for the night. We're low on food and supplies. We ran into trouble some time before we arrived." Ren courtesy besought of her.

"Of course, Ren. You will always be welcome here. I'll need to prepare sleeping quarters for you all, living in a lighthouse doesn't allow much leeway for the unexpected guest." Jenna cordially extended a tender encouragement. She looped away to forage through the nearby parts of the incomplete domain.

"Niddler and I can share a room." Ren offered to his caretaker and the monkeybird craned up at him. "If you don't have enough space I can make due with a cot, or outside." He suggested with a gallant simplicity.

"Don't be so jestful, Ren! I would be offended, but I've certainly raised you well." Jenna insisted affectionately as she arranged things in a compartment of the building. Of course she would find room.

"Clam-bake and..." Niddler gasped, ogling the unprepared recipes. "Heavenly hamn-fin!" He fell to the floor, swooning with bliss.

"Make sure you help Jenna if you want leftovers, Niddler." Tula cautioned by leaning down to pat a fleecy neck before returning to depart.

"With a spread like this, why wouldn't I?" The monkeybird happily whooped and hooted as he emerged from the floor.

"Tula and I need to gather supplies in town, if we can, Jenna. The Wraith needs many repairs, I'm afraid. Ioz and Jazhea will stay here with Niddler." Ren precipitously launched into motion once more, Tula waved him a peek.

"Of course Ren, we'll prepare supper while you're gone. Do be careful though, Octopon can still be a dangerous place. Even with the improvements that have been made." Jenna sighed and showed her soulchild leave once more. The swinging mesh tapped the exitway.

"How have your sunrises been, Jenna?" Ioz began by making light conversation as Ren and Tula set out into the depths of the city.

"Fair enough. Needless to say, I'm more than happy Ren has made it this far." Jenna smiled but her ambiance was one of solitude and tension. "Ioz, would you mind collecting some grain from the storage-basement? It's farther down the spiral staircase, it's the room surrounded by a moat at the very bottom. Becareful though, that heavy door tends to stick and you can very easily be locked inside." She briskly diverged to other matters.

"No matter. As long as I don't have to break my vow upon leaving the Maelstrom, that I'll never see another spud." Ioz shrugged out of boredom, deciding to be a sport.

"That's fine." Jenna fairly composed. She bustled to and fro, soon preparing to digress for the kitchen.

"Jenna, why didn't you tell brother that Vaecusa knew of Mizar hiding the Chronicles of Octopon? I know I couldn't stop the Day of Fire, but for three years I could have prevented Sir Phorlock's forced shore-training of Mantus and Qui-Qua's disbanded cowards on Kalinda...if I he was seeking to find that ancient scroll in the Valley of the Quiin. Say could have warned her yahil of Z.M.Q.'s attempt to return to the settlement." After Ioz left Jazhea shuffled her eyes, seeking honest appraisal to a peculiar query.

"Many reasons. Though your aunt was pleasantly allied with Phorlock, she knows no more use than him. Besides, it was Saytai the Sibyl who returned Mizar and the Arakna map back to Kalinda in the Day of Fire's aftermath but even years earlier she would have not been able to use Primus's last notes for The Surge. Ren needs to only to worry about this dangerous Quest he is on before he can even consider using that, if it has been found." Jenna hummed as she brought utensils into the next room for setting.

In the peaceful realm of Octopon, a man and woman meandered through the sidestreets as the levitating sun dispersed at their backs. Twilight dew coated the shimmering sky as gleams of color rebounded off of the crystal buildings.

"It feels like forever since we've been to this market, I wonder how many of the places we used to go to have been improved. We really haven't been given much time to ourselves, have we?" Ren reflected as he stretched an aching shoulder.

"You can say that again." Tula replied with a concurring groan. "I would be worried about Ioz, especially when he has to make the repairs early tomorrow. I wonder how he is doing with only Jenna and our new friend to keep him company." She seriously doubted, she hefted forth her portion of lumber and tools for the future journey. Her flickering mind was fazed only by a hint of negativity. She watched the slow bustle of the comforting, yet foreign location.

"I think Ioz can handle himself, Tula." Ren distinctly gladdened as he gazed up into the stellar dome dabbled with blots of silver. "It's too bad we don't have time to walk through the Star Meadows, in all of Octopon that was the one park district I enjoyed going to the most. The Ruins of Taikal are just beyond, so many abundant streams and shores to play in, I would build sand castles of the Palace of Scholars. I'd like to go back someday." He fluently recollected, bubbling with a boyish optimism. "You know, I almost don't want to think about it but this Quest has made me change ?on a lot of the memories that used to be so close to me." He faintly verbalized as the fields of high sea-grass were billowing only a taut spread away from the outskirts of the plaza, both could admire the attraction of the alluring countryside.

"It's the same with me, Ren, but I remember everything. You lived a quiet life. It's...different. I'm happy we're on this Quest together, it's much better than just experiencing the sun rise and fall in some hapless barnacle-town. We're doing something to help the world we live in." The ebony-locked beauty maintained a chipper air but she contrarily could argue. Taking an oppressive breather, she couldn't stop herself from dwelling on their disparity. Ren had always been accepted and looked after while she was forced to find her own way.

"Son of Primus! Hey!" Suddenly, both colleagues were ripped from any prime emotional-state by a demanding wanderer. "Hey, you. I've heard about the good things you're doing, so why are you bumming around here? We'd be honored to have you as our guest, Young-Man the King!" The bothersome stranger hustled toward his target, almost shaking and grabbing the prince.

"Actually, umm..." Ren modestly withdrew from the scene, not certain how to reciprocate.

"Leave him alone, he has a crew to tend to!" Without thinking, Tula asserted her zeal in the face of the interrupter as she stalwartly defended the regent's right to privacy.

"Hey, get lost, beggar woman! I didn't ask you, I asked the Son of Primus!" The insensitive patron imprudently rebuffed.

"You get lost, darva-grub! I'm part of his crew and you're bothering him!" Tula's fury only heightened, though she now wished she had let Ren deal with it himself. She was becoming too resentful and quite upset all the more, she imagined she was embarrassing herself. Ren's mouth gaped, the inclination to form words between the competitors not arriving.

"Part of his crew? No way! Son of Primus wouldn't recruit a woman for a crewmate, that'd be like asking a korba-cat to total a sextant reading. That requires brains! You're a real vodelinger, sea-flora, now run on home!" The accosting civilian laughed as if he were just told a widely satisfying joke. For once, Tula withdrew.

"She's not a beggar woman, she's part of my crew! I won't have this disrespect in my Kingdom, I know I can't yet call myself King of this land but I know my father would never tolerate this! How dare you disgrace Octopon, the home where I grew up, with this vulgarity! Now away with you before I have you banished!" Ren threatened with an almost malevolent anger. Tula breathlessly turned her stare around.

"I'm sorry, Your Highness I didn-" The spectator immediately apologized, awfully ashamed.

"Go!" Ren ordered with something of a lion in his tempo. The partisan swerved to quickly disengage. "Sorry, Tula." He snooped a glance at his friend to sincerely pardon.

"Why? It wasn't your fault." Tula was awed at Ren's reaction, normally she would feel nothing but admiration for him when he stood up against injustice but she was much too steamed to feel anything but sour qualm. Everything she ever wanted to forget about the world had come screaming out after her with a blaring reminder.

"Did you think I would let-" Ren began to justify furthermore.

"Shh!" With a mere instant to spare, Tula pounced on Ren with a hand clasped over the stunned venturer's mouth. She pressed him down next to her and behind tall grasses, causing him to drop his share of the purchased equipment.

"The Laughing S-" The Octopian royal instantaneously made the association.

"Don't say it!" The hunched-over indicator witnessed an arching interest. "Oh no..." Her shushed alert drifted when the thief of the time dashed a bearded neck to the origin of the ruffle. "What do you want to bet he's looking for us?" She murmured with welded attention.

"By the Crown of Octopon, you're right, Tula." Ren whispered at ear length. He twitched his view at the intrigued brow of the stalker in range of the lamp-poles. Three clacks circled to the opposite pathway.

"We have to warn Ioz. He can't know the Wraith is here." Tula proposed with a fully-aligned nod from her trusted accomplice. They waited in stillness until the stranger with one metal arm and two clicking legs scattered into the broad metropolis.

Later in the evening, the three adventures and the new friend as well as the old sat at the table to partake of dinner. The chatter of discussion excited through the room.

"Ok, everyone. We just need to find out where Bloth will go next. We know he hasn't marked off the last Treasure, but we can assume he knows we have it. So that only leaves..." Ren addled over the chart before him. He pushed away a bite on his plate, restlessly tapping it with a fork. Ioz, adjoining to his chair, scrunched eyes at the perturbing writings.

"Ren, why don't you take a break and eat? There's plenty of time to discuss this later." Tula intelligently suggested, she wearily sighed at the bold lad across from her, who hardly made a dent in his food. Even though he followed his own sense of righteousness, when it came to his Quest Ren was often influenced by the older sailor in this regard.

"Tula is right, Ren. You need to keep your strength up. Like me." Niddler happily chirped from chomping down on a savory puuka-luuka pie. "Can I have seconds, Jenna? I've worked up an appetite!" He politely cooed, hoping for more.

"Sorry, I guess I'm taking too much into this." Ren delicately conceded, he slid the map away. He could not prevent the notice of a different kind of aura from his ecomancer partner since he started talking.

"No, we need to figure this out as soon as possible. Bloth is moving while we are eating and resting. We don't have time to waste with things like stuffing our faces, Niddler." Ioz disagreed, flat-palming the table and remarking especially on his feathered-pal's banquet-raiding habits. He groped the paper and inspected it. "We need to figure out what Oracle in Gulf means, as well as the next location that gelatinous sea-slug is headed to. Plus, if we can find the 13th Treasure of Rule before Bloth does, we can sell the map. I'll bet the yuugla-freaks will buy it and read it at dinnertime, during their purges of surfing-trunks." The coarse man added and returned the map to the previous laid-out position.

"It doesn't hurt to take a break every once in a while. Lighthouse business, Ren?" Niddler sensibly contested as he peeked up from his munching.

"One of the locations doesn't make sense, Ioz. The last one, it's marked so far up North that it only touches the page. It makes me wonder whether Bloth made a mistake. I can't even see what he was trying to write..." Ren augmented his input to the conversation.

Tula puffed silently. "Sometimes I think they were born to make things hard on themselves. I can see why you would want to be a man, look at how blissfully stubborn they are." In Jazhea Tula confided, trying to make light exchange. The other lass showed her attention to her, but did not comment.

"He has fish-face on his side. Why would he make a mistake?" Ioz skeptically argued. He retired to his supper, laboriously drafting his mug.

"If you don't mind me cutting in, they weren't the only two who ever saw the map. Though I don't think anyone else wrote on it." Jazhea bluntly entered the discussion.

"It may be best, Ren, to disregard the map completely. Whether it came intentionally into your hands or not, it may be falsified. Remember, there is always room for error." Jenna wisely compelled, from the table she glanced at the young woman who had just discoursed. "Of what you were telling me earlier, Jazhea?" She uneasily inquired of the obdurate lady.

"I hadn't heard anything from the professors from when I still attended, mostly I've dealt with one-on-one so I wouldn't know any gossip. Taneuka doesn't know where Vaecusa or Loren are either." Jazhea flatly answered, she concentrated on nipping her meal with care.

"Pango Neeja! You knew Tanueka?!" Ioz jut his attention at her statement.

"When I left home, yes. She was my travelmate for most of the years I was searching for Vaecusa. I knew her before then, she was a family friend of her and Mizar. She's spoken of you, of course. I knew Uyel too, though I sometimes found him more affable than she was." Jazhea explained with stark sophistication.

"What? Uyel can be a pain. You knew him well?" Ioz pried, partially influenced by his own sensitivity for his former beau.

"Please, Ioz. The high-seas are no place for a ceremony." Jazhea sharply illustrated, her eloquent manner bordering much of snarky.

"Excuse me." Ioz chided hastily and resumed sipping his soup. "I personally disagree." He did not resist the urge.

"Well, that answers that question." Niddler commented carelessly, slurping down his fare.

"Have you heard from Kayraadin?" Jenna puzzled over with significance, she directed to Jazhea.

"Kayraadin is..." Jazhea began to fill in the blank, she made an unusual movement. She lurched.

"Kayraadin?" Ren wondered with interest at the name previously disclosed, his eyes flicked at his blood-sister.

"I'm not mentioning it, here. Or anywhere. Be wary under roofs, some eels live in ceilings." Jazhea sternly erupted after a prolonged pause. The revolted glimpse of her blanched face could be caught before she shot one pained glance at them all. She picked up from her seat and pounded out of the room.

"What was that about?" Tula instantly jarred out of a mental flux, dumbfounded and intrigued as she watched the other woman slam away.

"I hope she will say something soon." Jenna peered at the pink warrior, words laced with concern.

After the shipmates had touched base and caught up at dinner, the party of five settled down to rest. The two full moons of pearl shone through the brimming windows of the conical dome.

Ren gazed out at the moonlight splendor, he propped his head against his palm as he lay sidelong with his elbow. He had fallen asleep earlier, but now he had reawaken and could not sleep though he tired so. He spotted the map that endured in a rolled-up condition across from him. It would be unlikely his opposer would show up here, but knowing this did not put the idea out of mind. He liked being back home, but when he was he could not slumber. He troubled. He heard little birdlike squeaks and breathy snores from the right side of him.

"Mmm, Minga-melons! Puuka-Luuka pie!" Discernibly, an intermission could be noted and a crinkle of patting feathers. "Goija-sticks!" Niddler, who napped next to the prince, muttered in a joyful but softly snoozing ramble. He shifted, then quieted.

Ren turned over so his head leaned back against the pillow. The bed felt more supple than what he was used to and the monkeybird orchestra twinged with unusual voraciousness tonight, but he doubted this could be why he could not sleep. He rolled his head. Quiet wavered in the room. Then he heard a noise impending from the steps below, followed by a flash of something shadowy and flowing, a movement resembling roseate silk under a silver gloss. His blue eyes inclined toward the burst but it was gone, she flit away as hastily as she saw him looking at her. "Sleep fruitfully, Niddler." He got up, conscious not to wake the monkeybird dozing beside him, who was out like a tipsy barman. Mindful not to dally, he tiptoed airily for the stairwell.

"Ren, what're you doing now, chasing the woman at this time of night..." Ren heard Ioz's muddled thrum from opposite the room and he jounced in reaction, but he observed the half-asleep pirate. The growing adult sealed a finger to his lips to shush the companion and tapped off down the stairs.

The moonbeam-cloaked prince crouched on sound and lively feet down the spiral staircase until he at last met a window and a lonely pair of green eyes beaming at him. He refrained, then he resumed his leisure stroll to her. "Is everything okay, Tula?" The shy lad benevolently imposed. He tread a path to her in the plain space, joining her in sitting beneath the outlooking purview.

"I'm fine, Ren. I couldn't sleep." Tula quietly conversed from next to him, she beheld the platinum glow sparkling over the water.

"You know, Tula." Ren watched out with her and he started to talk purposefully. "I think I wanted to know more about my family and my place. I didn't think everything was so complicated from the beginning. I don't know what to do now, I can't help feeling doubtful of my Father's alling. Even after Jenna told me more, it's all so confusing." He blinked down at his hands as he relayed to his peer the words presenting from his current stress. He began to toy with the miniature tuft of hair under his chin as ideas flew through his essence.

"I understand, Ren. I don't truly know what happened to my family either. My father and brother traveled just North of this place to visit the Academy of Ecomancy there, before it was destroyed by the Crisis in Octopon. Only my mother was left to raise my younger siblings and I, but that all changed when they were almost taken away." Tula's subdued wisp fastidiously relinquished a would-be nerve, she sat alone except the youthful confidant beside her. She did not cease gazing out to sea. Ren curled around to regard her with surprise.

"Really, Tula. You've never said anything about that before." Ren now gawked up at her, he had been taken quite aback by her sudden reveal. She often wasn't the type to talk of herself.

Tula glanced at him and issued? a delicate smile. "That's because it was long ago, but I didn't forget. After the dark water began to take hold of Andorus, more of our people sought to learn ecomantic talents to save our land. Our island was ravaged at a time, the enemy tried to take our people because he wanted to use us and what little magic he knew for his own benefit. Andorus was once a prosperous island full of many riches derived from the soil, as were powerful nutrients that could be stolen from it's environment as well. Ecomancers kept my island strong, and in their absence, the life substance was leeched from everything." Tula's eyes were cast nether as she acquainted on the event. Her lashes fluttered ever-slightly.

"Very sad." Ren sincerely bid, his even temper endured. He whisked his head toward the landscape to swallow the fresh details. "Who was 'the enemy', you speak of?" After countering some indecision he prudently asked. She faintly gleamed up at him and he knew the answer. ?He met his pupils to the ground. "What about Teron?" He questioned, if only out of interest. She had begun to open up to him but he would stop at the first inclination of seeking too much. Teron had been featured in the picture of him with the Royal family, but Teron originated from Andorus. Even though his Father had chosen the astute aide for the Royal Council, he did not understand it.

"Teron was a grat elder in our land, one with amazing powers and also an Ecomance-healer who knew many things. Before I learned of my as an ecomancer, Teron ?spoke of my mother and father. They never needed Andorian soil to keep them active, but it was because they hid it from me. Bloth was after them for that reason...I was raised as a warrior from day one as all in my family were. The first Temple-Year I attended mother and sisters were going to take me to the River of Randor for the picnic festivities, I still remember the butterfly I was chasing before I became lost in the brush." Tula digressed to allow a passing laugh to escape her lips. "I came upon a ravine of bizarre black, and instantly ran the opposite direction instead of the way I should have gone. Dark water back then had not yet overtaken, but it began to increase as more ecomancers were taken from our isle. I was young then, scared like I still am. I flew through the forest as fast as I could run, unsure of how to return until I encountered Teron while he was reviving patches of our dying groves. We tried to find my parents. Finally, he? did. That was the moment that changed everything." Images of full feathers and leafy vines cascading from far heights above Andorus filled Tula's eyes, so long ago events had soured yet those visions were clarion as crystal.

"Go on..." Ren only wanted to be told everything.

"Bloth and his pirates arrived and were ready to take mother and sisters, and they would have, if Teron didn't offer himself in their place. He was so knowledgeable, I think Bloth no longer held interest in any other ecomancer. Unfortunately, while I was upset over my family being torn away from me, I made a mistake and one I didn't even know then. I saw a blinding light of blue, I now know from myself and I was taken as well. I don't remember how I was captured or what happened after that, all I know is someone very kind helped me out, and it wasn't Teron..." Tula tangled on her volatile recollection.

"Someone kind? Please, go on. If you want to, of course." Ren encouraged her to continue on without any expectations, Tula nodded.

"I really can't remember. I can remember thinking of her as kind and beautiful, with hair like a rose. Like? my oldest sister, she was quite clever. Brave, like Mother. I didn't believe her when she transferred me into a ditty so I could board another ship where I would be safer. The plan for my escape allowed fr and I was raised completely on a pirate ship, one different from the Maelstrom. I remained until I came of age, and left as a wharf-rat. It wasn't because I couldn't stay, but I felt estranged in my surrogate home. I ended up begging for board in stingy taverns and later on, I had accepted my life until by chance I met someone from home. After Teron had been, he recieved a message from captured?vity, and I was one of the few remaining Andorian warriors capable of saving him...he said Teron knew how to find my parents, and that I was looking in the wrong place the whole time. My family and the my world...depended on me." She paused from recounting her tale to take a breather, she culminated a forlorn glance up at the affection.

"This is why you were willing to put your life-" Ren had been about to say something to her, but she proceeded with her account.

"It wasn't just Bloth. Obviously other pirates aimed to plunder Andorus and take it's people, but out of all of them he succeeded the most. He did even more damage to us than what the Valjen were capable of and they were not to be messed with. There still the Viva tree that used to provide little sustenance to keep us alive after most of our people had defected from our groups in the villages built around the roots. Even then, Andorus fell into much downfall because of the hordes alone. The accumulation of invaders and pestilence weakened Andorus until it's desolation." The ecomancer ended her saga with an audible resentment of the harsh circumstances. Her resolution temporarily minimized, she bore deep into Ren's eyes with her own shining florals. The partial teen experienced a wave of sadness overtaking him as she finished reciting her unfortunate story.

"Tula, that's terrible, I'm so sorry that had to happen to you and the people of Andorus. It's a lot like what Octopon has gone through, so much has happened on this Quest it's a pirate's tale to think of how I'm still here sometimes. Like Niddler said, the lighthouse business is still open. If only I could go back..." Ren sought to console, he reviewed her with sympathy and compassion. He felt her pain and wanted so much to comfort and soothe her, but he did not know the first thing about how. His mind became rapid, he directed his ideas with tormenting difficulty.

"All I've really wanted to do since then is return home. I don't know if my family made it out alive or where they are now. I often wonder about what happened to them, Teron did not know any more than I did after we brought him back." Tula concentrated on the ocean moreover, dwelling too much on her inmost processes. "I fought so hard to save my mentor, you wouldn't believe what dissolution sailing with all the sorry losers of Mer will do to the spirit. I wouldn't have even joined this Quest if I hadn't heard father and brothers were taken with Teron. Working in a Janda-town tavern is a punishment fit for savages, and I would have given up hope if I had to stay any more time than it took to get out. It's often quite lonely thinking about those days." She sighed and yielded her palm to the floor, she had not noticed when it unconsciously slid near Ren's arm.

"Tula." Ren hesitated for a spell before he again whispered the name of the accustomed woman. "I want to save Mer from the dark water and restore everything to a rightful place but when I finish the Quest..." He stumbled with words, impeded by internal haze. "I don't know what I want then. It's been bothering me, though we only have two Treasures left to collect, I'm not sure if like what will happen when all of this is over. Ever since my Father told me to search for the Treasures, I've wanted to with all my heart but I don't want to be the King of Octopon, it's a big responsibility. Of course I know I won't be able to sail anymore and the friendships I have will change...but worse, I fear I won't be capable as only knowing the life of a lighthousekeeper. How should I protect all of Octopon? How should I fill my Father's shoes, I have to do it alone?" The prince quivered his stare as he wrangled with his rationale. "What I really want to do is right what is wrong, I know it sounds improbable but that is what I want to do." He culminated his uncertain understanding, sounding concise, yet feeble. His inflection speckled, he pendulated between frustration and anxiety.

Tula leaned near to him, her intense emerald eyes glittered with emotion and light. "Ren..." The ebony-beauty's voice peaked as if inhibited. "I feel the same thing. I know you'll make a great King, Ren. Contrarily, I don't think there's much of a life for me to return to when there's something still out there I cannot find." She expressed softly, her eyes met his and they attached with each other's for a sustained time. Tula broke the moment by staring out at the waves underneath the moonlit harbor. "Of course, I would love to go back to my old life. Not the one I was forced to live. Sometimes when I look out to sea, I think of home. It's beautiful, like Andorus's waterfalls and firefly meadows in winter. Home and how it should be...without the dark water. I know that's silly and impossible though." The little calm radiance crossed the ecomancer's lips when her chiming burble subsided. Without realizing it, the two arms had closely entwined and neck melted to nape. Not yet had they realized the warmth within.

"It's not. It is nice. The harbor, I mean." Ren admired the expansive yonder of royal turquoise with her. For the first time since he had started the Quest, he felt truly relaxed. Peaceful, even, as if he were somewhere else. He had not bothered over the dark water and Bloth, or the Quest. He fell into a daze until his focus jarred anew. The tiny lone ship passed by on the horizon.

"Ren, Tula! what's going on?" The two questmates snapped their heads about in cursed surprise, being thrown crassly back into reality. Ioz stood at the doorway, springing in a panicked gape. He donned an oddly colored magenta-robe, which didn't suit him at all and positioned with blade drawn in his hand. He steeled toward the far-out horizon at the passing dinghy, which appeared to be doing no more than skating by. It disappeared into the distance.

"Oh! Ioz!" Ren faltered with a widened stare of azure. Tula startled and crinkled her neck as a gasp emerged from her mouth, which she covered with her palm.

Niddler resulted from behind Ioz, wearing a nightcap. "Hey, what's the deal waking me up at this time of night! I need my feather-rest!" The monkeybird argued with a squawk, hands on his haunches at the pirate.

"Shut your beak, monkeybird!" Ioz shouted in a whisper at the loud avian. Niddler angrily chattered.

Ren roused in a flash. "Uhh, nothing." Ren stuttered as he gathered his bearings. "Everyone get some rest, we set sail first thing in the morning!" Ren declared audibly, and speedily shot back up the stairs. The puerile sailor had not even distinguished a footstep from behind him. Ioz barely managed to catch Ren's embarrassed face as the boy flashed past. Tula leapt up with wit and shrugged curiously at the man who had barged in, scampering on fire-heel back to the girls' room. The observing sea-vet traded glances with the irksome monkeybird and strangely felt as if he had missed something but he also felt the tinge of his nagging conscience cross his mind, if only for an interval. He pivoted on foot and trot back to bed, squawking monkeybird snugly following.

The very next morning, the Merrian sun steadily rose in the sky. Two heavy moons depressed below the horizon. The skies incandesced with color as bustle activated a lighthouse just South of Octopon, a rugged swab and a monkeybird loaded a nearby and docked ship with stock and provisions. Away from the floating vessel and somewhere inside, two voices chatted briefly from the tower.

"So that's what she did?" The middle-aged woman in the room intoned gently but with trouble.

"Yes." The young man affirmatively preserved in response.

"I see. I am sorry to hear she has grown to be that way." The sapient woman began to discourse once more, succeeding a pause. She inspected a frame she nestled in her open palms. "Jazhea is not well to deal with rigidity, she perhaps even learned a number of things about human nature that would have been better left alone. Her thinking she had a leverage due to her heritage and lack of encounters with any real threats I imagine may have contributed to her attempted deception of Bloth." Her voice retained a succoring thoughtfulness. "Vaecusa, Evelyn's sister, and aunt to the both of you..." She sequentially carried on. "Was a strict guardian from our land. I believe that Vaecusa had only told Jazhea a few things about the past years, when she was taken away to and presumably set free. This is the only occasion I have seen her since before your mother's departure, Ren. Jazhea however, is physically unfit to take the throne and your brothers...never returned from Valjen's ransom. You are the last heir, for now and for every future." Jenna revised Ren's misconception as she returned the picture to her recipient, Ren was seated across from her.

"Unfit, in what way, and why can she not take this burden from me? Is she not the daughter of my father, King Primus? Does this Z.M.Q. have something to do with this...purple mist, this strange force in those slugs that somehow stop the Treasures of Rule from taking effect? Why does it have to be me, Jenna?" Ren huffed a still breath as he was discouraged, dragged down by a desire to be elsewhere. He hadn't known how much before that he would do almost anything to alleviate this workload put upon him.

"Do not worry, I would tell you anything that could be done for her. Vaecusa needed to keep her family strong, as she was a fighter who aided your father and Mizar. She did have responsibilities with me, as a royal servant and palace caretaker as well." The keeper refrained. "It was actually her devout friend who returned your father's sword to this lighthouse after his capture, the Emperor of a once prominent nation of Northern skies, so it is told." She adjourned relaying her insight and attended to the more considerable matter at hand. "I will do what we agreed upon, if she stays here I will keep watch over her. Though, I don't think I'll be of any help in knowing where Vaecusa has gone, I have been out of communication with anyone of my sisters' relation since your father's Quest." Jenna confirmed the request and sat to read the expression of the well-born prince, her hands folded in her lap.

"I see. If sister can't find her caretaker, then it's only one more burden I'm powerless to help. Is there anything else?" Ren quelled, he diverted his head to the sight outside of Ioz and Niddler arranging the Wraith. The man and the monkeybird appeared to be breaking into a petty squabble. He ably caught a glance of the pirate thrusting a sack of grain to the floor in ire. He could not be sure where Tula had gotten to. He aimed his eyeline back to Jenna.

"Actually, Ren. I think I may still have it here, somewhere." Jenna poised from her chair at a whim, rushing to rummage for a notion. Ren was left in wonder as she disappeared behind a counter and scoured through an array of furnishings. Finally, she returned bearing a moderately bulky accessory sealed in a luxurious sheet of crimson. She unwrapped the rich fabric and unfolded the artifact in full. "Do you know what it is, Ren?" She awaited his sagacity.

"The seal of Octopon, a crown? My father's?" Ren posed a guess, blue rings lighting up with astonishment.

"Your mother's, Ren. Be careful, it is not very strong to touch. Only two Queens of Octopon have worn this crown, one of them was Evelyn, your mother." Jenna administered the bearing with caution, letting Ren brush the circlet with a spry finger.

Ren stroked the sacred octopus-insignia on the headband derived from pure gold. "Who was the other?" The adolescent prodded moreso as he wonderfully lifted the tiara and placed it atop his own head's crest, but it only sloped. "I think it's too big." He assessed as he yielded it in his palms once again.

"Yes, Evelyn was a tall one." Jenna agreed with a knowing amusement. "The other who wore this crown was Queen Avadasia, Dowager of Octopon's Star Meadows, and the Third District where the Palace of Scholars lies. Remember my stories as a boy? She married your King Primus's father." She educated her heart-child. Ren resumed his seat, pointing his scouting at the glisten of vert stones embedded into the eyes and lacing the trim of the emblem. "Her crown was of course adorned with Ruukaana, a rare, but now discontinued metal. The orbs look very much like gemstones, but they are fashioned of a pure ore from regions far North." Jenna noticed his interest and willingly appended.

For the moment, Ren was bedazzled with the antique. He delayed before he cast away his retention. "Is there anything else you can tell me?" Ren challenged Jenna one final time.

"I'm afraid not." Jenna admitted competently, it seemed to sink in with Ren.

"Alright." Ren accepted with a nod and stood up. "Thank you so much Jenna. I should be heading out now. Ioz and Niddler need my help." Ren graciously imparted, giving his guardian a big hug and one last smile as he receded to the door.

"Be careful, Ren." Jenna bid him farewell, she placated her response.

"I will." The royal genially conferred. On Ren's route out of the building and to return to the ship, he met glance on a female form whom he envisioned might be Tula. Then he heeded his sister, who meandered up to him. She evidently had awaken after he intended to depart.

"Morning, Ren." Jazhea welcomed with a yawn, she extended her arms skyward to herald the day.

"Goodmorning." The prince greeted her back without a conspicuous inflection.

"Brother..." Jazhea started to articulate as she drew closer to him. "I really am sorry for everything I did and everything that happened. I know I messed up. I'm sort of...jealous of all the attention you have because I know I'll never be as brave as you, but I tried to make it right once I realized what I did. I just did the wrong thing, in the wrong way. I didn't realize how bad he and his thugs really are, and I know now. I'm going to help Octopon's people now. Honest." She fumbled with her apology, presently downcast. "I know you don't want me to come with you anymore but I want you to know that I really did mean it and I promise I'm going to make it up to you somehow. Okay?" She confronted him in his field of view, expecting answer.

Ren did not know what to say but he decided to believe her, realizing it could no longer hurt anything. "Okay, Jazhea. I'll remember." Ren acknowledged with neutral accuracy. He turned away to go outside the lighthouse and boarded the Wraith. The quarrel plainly ceased, but he still did not see Tula. "Where's Tula, Ioz?" He probed with perplexity to the wayfarer with the onyx ponytail, who ranged only a stride away from him.

"Ay chunga, she's still gathering supplies. She should be out soon though because we're ready to go!" Ioz sounded uncommonly positive in his tempo, he crossed his arms proudly at the pile of goods that he had painstakingly lodged into order. Niddler climbed up from the storage hold at that time, munching on a snack. "I already made sure the hold was clear, Ren, when we hit the high-seas we don't want to give Bloth anything to sink us with. Nothing we can't leave in port, at least." Ioz rotated to meet Ren and allot him a puzzled glance, suggesting a remembrance of something that did not become clear. In that moment, Tula's outline teetered from the lighthouse, carrying some rations as she bumped the door closed behind her with a shake of curvaceous hips.

Time elapsed until the crew of four cruised out to sea, only then had they heavily talked about the discovery of the map. Ren let Ioz dissect the wound-up paper as he steered the Wraith abroad from Octopon.

"Ren, I don't like this at all. If Bloth already knows where the Treasures are, that means he can claim them before we even arrive there." Ioz muttered with glum unease as he stood by Ren's right edge. He disordered the map in his hands.

"I'm more worried about How he knows where we're going." Ren indicated immovably, pointing his eyes to the buccaneer next to him. "What does the Dark Dweller know about the Treasures? It's clear he can't claim them himself or he would have by now, it seems to me like he's using Bloth to-" Ren began and ended unfinished when he perceived a figment in his vision, he eased his eyes.

"The Dark Dweller can't have the Compass of Rule, and neither does Bloth. I'm wondering if the Dark Dweller can somehow detect where the Treasures are." Tula astutely prompted forth on Ren's statement. She tediously ran fingers over the mysterious melody engraved in the living wood of the Wraith.

"I wouldn't doubt it, Tula. It's already everywhere as it is." Ren speculated as he fought to steadily plow the craft through the violent waters of black. "Niddler! How does the water look?" He shouted to the monkeybird off the bow.

"It's clear now, Ren!" Niddler called back with a furry hand to his beak, he hustled in the air to chase away a whirlpool of evil-ooze in the aisle. From the helm, Ren witnessed the purple fizz and smoke.

"Good work, Niddler." Ren merrily praised his feathered-friend. "Bloth knows my secret now, so we have to try to stay clear of him as much as possible." The Captain of the Wraith proclaimed with fortitude in his gust.

"That's unusual for you, lad. Usually you leave all the worrying to me and Tula." Ioz chuckled to him in jest.

"I say it's just a good thing Ren's secret is only between Bloth and us." Tula distressingly hopped her eyes abound to every nook. The memory of Ren's abolishment of the Constrictus never did settle with her. Though she was right no one else witnessed what she saw, it was a another plague hostile with her divinely-developed sensitivity.

Ren smiled and lit with a bantam laugh. "That's true, Ioz. I guess I'm just thinking more about my role in things for now." Ren spoke of his most profound conclusions. He worried now, in the light of what happened. It seemed to be growing even more dangerous for them now, Bloth had become more aggressive and to surpass that notion, he also was cooperating with Morpho and the idea of that was even more distressing. He tried not to brood over the consequences of these occurrences. He found himself compelled to reflect on what Tula told him last night. She had not mentioned it since she divulged her narrative then, but in that moment he knew she held more fear in herself than she outwardly cast. He felt the strong feeling telling him he would have to protect her. Ioz had been acting a petty different toward him too, since the moonrise prior. He could not place his finger on the issue of his friend seeming nicer as if not entirely solaced about something, but maybe. Ren could have found it to be very peculiar, but he knew not to stir on that blemish. The Compass animated in a display of zest, beaconing South. He shot eyes on the map and he recognized the locality, to which it bore a gleam. The place containing the sea of Aymara, the same field of ocean his father had been captured in and bravely fought his final battle and the same place the Imbiber on Ren's search for the 10th Treasure had told to go. "Prepare for the Fogweed of Aymara!" He fearlessly boomed as he muscled onward to the uncharted territories beyond, he paused a slight. "In the seas where my father fell." He flickered his eyes, drawing out burdened words as he knew the foreshadowed remainder of his Quest would not be easy.

"It's going to be a lot more dangerous up ahead." Ioz warned with an attitude still brimming with confidence. He stationed a hand on Ren's shoulder as the young adventurer beamed at him and gestured a nod. Niddler cooled, taking a break. He flew over to the wheel as Tula climbed the stairway.

"That didn't stop us before, now let's uncover that 12th Treasure, and save Mer! The Quest must go on!" Tula encouraged with a new sense of certainty, she drew close and glistened at the kindly prince who spun the brigade on the road to destiny.

"We'll do it, as a team!" Niddler cheered on. Everyone gifted him a grateful grin.

"For Octopon and Mer!" Ren proudly signified through a bold initiative, he admired his loyal crew, who were also his loyal friends. They saved his back as many times as he had saved theirs. He beamed at all of them, showing his attachment. He veered a warm gaze to the woman on the ship. For a while they all clasped hands as if in a deep understanding of the bond only these four knew of and could not be destroyed, even at the threat of death. Life for them was dangerous and scary sailing the twenty seas of Mer as pirates on it's waters, but it was the only life they knew and the only way they would ever have it. They shared a smile of devotion, heading off into the great frontiers beyond.

Part ?

It had been a pronounced deal of time later when the Wraith zigzagged a road through blackened waters and by a journey long-awaited, approximated the sea of Aymara. Arriving, if only due to the abundant wind. The captain at the wheel on the ship had pushed the vessel continuously until at last reaching the destination. To the marvel of everyone on board, a magical shard fashioned like a scale blinked with mercurial flashes of white.

"Ren, what's with the Treasure?" The black-haired swashbuckler on the ship, Ioz, pondered as he viewed the fragment the monkeybird beside him clutched with paws.

Ren fluctuated, surprised as he abandoned the wheel. "Hold on." The blond noble instructed, and he tapped down the steps to inspect the glowing jewel that was commencing to twinkle as if portending of something. It did not repose in any direction, it only proceeded to blink. "Ioz, I think it's telling us to wait. It doesn't want us to go anywhere." Ren founded on the conclusion, at Ioz's doubt.

"How do you know that?" The dusky pirate disbelievingly disputed.

"It's hard to explain Ioz, but I think it's trying to communicate with me." Ren ascertained with candor as Ioz merely raised an eyebrow in suspect. It had been then when Ioz would have to concede to Ren's correct hunch. From off the starboard of the Wraith, the four crew-members astonished at a behemoth mountain of coral rising in front of them, but it did not graze the ship.

"Chungo lungo! It's the Legendary Floating Coral-Reef!" Ioz hysterically shouted as he stepped back against the wooden ledge of the red floater, he sprinted to the wheel with no secondary devices in mind and frantically began to tear away.

"Floating coral-reef?" Ren puzzled of the hasty reception. "You've heard of this, Ioz?" He heeded of the man at the steering wheel, who now absolutely riveted for evacuation. Tula stayed to tug at the riggings.

"Only too well! It's a dangerous density of coral and it traps ships, keeping them stuck for days! There are terrible creatures in there too, we don't want to find out what would happen if we got tangled there!" Ioz manifested frank nerve as he made a rattling swerve and then compelled on. "Only saw it once before, and if I wasn't on the Maelstrom at the time I would've been fish-food." He darkly circulated, Ren decided to go with him on that.

Ren embraced the Treasure in his hand and granted it a smile. "Ioz, can you take us South of here? That's where the Compass points!" Ren instructed to the pilot as they had started to retreat away from the hazard. "It's a strong magnetic charge." He remarked of the Compass burning in a way never seen before.

"Got it. The dark water is finally letting up! Ay chunga, I haven't seen waters so clear since in Janda-town!" Ioz obligingly outcried, expressing jubilant relief. To the shipmates' phenomenal realization, the waters were very halcyon, almost as intact as in the genesis of the Quest.

"This could only mean the Treasure is nearby!" Ren yelled out from the bow of the Wraith as he scoured forward, the frosty ray of the Compass honed in on a mark straight ahead. "Keep us on course, Ioz, we'll be there soon." Ren commanded zestfully from his post, Tula studiously trimmed the sails for the advancing gust of favor.

"About time." Niddler breathed a sigh of satisfaction as he sat on his rump nearing the edge of the deck. He basked in the placid warmth as he chomped on the last minga-melon he could find, one which required a mini-safari to acquire. He had been able to catch some downtime at last.

Immediately, something pinged Tula's awareness. She scaled aloft to the crow's nest and using the looking-glass, she peeked out. She perused a mass accelerating in the opposite angle the Wraith glided. She unmistakably recognized the rigid and dull bones of the carious ship. "Maelstrom off the port bow!" The panicked ecomancer screamed from the sky. Ren and Ioz saw it. The Compass in Ren's cling was ablaze as it led to the water exactly underneath, the Maelstrom floated stationary.

"Noy jitat! Bloth's beat us here! In the Fogweed of Aymara!" Ren yelled out with impediment overtaking, he centralized steadfast eyes toward the horizon where his enemy surmounted.

"Guess we'll have to go in and hope Blue-lips doesn't see us. We can try this maneuver again." Ioz conducted grimly, he whipped the wheel to skulk for the forewarned target. He performed a steady maneuver to coast to the rear around the outer-peripheral, congruent to the time before in Pandaawa. He did not have much hope, but he took care to follow the design precisely.

"Full sail, Tula!" Ren commanded to his deckhand overhead. "Niddler, keep on watch!" He ordered to the monkeybird across from him. Ren freely flayed his sword from his belt, he folded a bag underneath as if preparing for action. His skylight eyes tensed.

To the dread of the crew on board, the tactic of stealth did not work well at all. The brute ship gyred as it noted the encroachment and commenced to barrel due forward at a startling speed. The face of the leviathan-fortress fast impressed, no longer could it feign a pillar among an isolated cloud.

"We'll have to get away from them, now!" Ioz roared abound, he whisked the ship around under his prowess. Tula slid on a rope and increased the sail to maximum proportion, pleading the conductivity of the gale would glide the Quest to the singular chance of deliverance.

"Ioz, steer us away!" Ren hollered in unison, the choppy waters curled away at the route.

"Ren, if I go any farther I'll take us into the reef! We have to go back another way!" Ioz countered Ren's guidance, desperate for respite. He rolled the boat to diverse direction, already the Wraith had been losing the zone of the Treasure but the quagmire at hand no longer enabled a choice.

"Ay jitata! They're fast approaching!" Tula alarmed as she slipped down from the mast above. She peered at Ren, who intensified with audacity. Then mighty vibrations began to shake the undertow, the crew viewed magnificent ripples being caused by extreme blasts. The powerhouse of the skeleton-ship bombarded fiery boulders from the anterior. Many of discharging showers impacted the water streaming behind, but one had burst dangerously near. "I think I can help!" Tula touched the carvings under her hands, tapping her powers into the Wraith to give Ioz a scarce breather. Her eyes were torn from their concentrating zeal on her ecomantic prowess as her head was forcibly thrown out of her trance. The minimal trek she had dotted through the rapids was not nearly sufficient. The Wraith was near to capsizing with it's bearing knocked out by the shock.

"We have to make for free water or that fish-lipped kreld-eater will swallow us whole!" Ioz thundered from the wheel, doing every possible task within his power to outrun the menace. He met sight on a snare of dark water, which demanded rapid response. He menially conquered the narrow lane. Adrenaline pumped through his veins and his heart flit, thumping in his sturdy ribcage. The ominous gunk had started to return, they were being chased too far North of the Treasure. "Monkeybird, we might need you soon!" Ioz vocalized outward distress as he did not see Niddler and could not digress aside to search for the absent avian. The monkeybird answered however, presumed to be dashing for where the Treasure had been placed. The Wraith weaved violently in the soaking battleground as it completed the wrenching glissade, the team verged on hurtling askew.

"I'll get it Ioz!" Niddler hectically cawed from fluttering everywhere on deck, hunting the Treasure. Ren and Tula had braced against the ending rail, laboring to trim the sails. Tula retained to Ren's back and their eyes locked in an infused but fluctuating stare. The huge roar of another barrage rumbled out as a cumbersome boulder plummeted one disparaging length away from the middle of the ship and both of them bellowed.

"Scot pango!" Ren swore overtly, drudging to wrestle for a footing. The current and the Wraith dithered from the tremor.

Ioz navigated a tight angle alongside a gulf of dark water, which would abolish the path. "Where is that monkeybird." Ioz muttered under laden breath. The crew had been granted minimal moments to brace before another catapult blast. This time wrought a Nycra which plastered like toxic mire, dead in the center of the mainsail. The material depreciated as the parasite completely dissolved past any hindrance, the spent creature crashed limp to the floorboards. "Noy jitat!" He cursed at the eyeshot of the invading pestilence. The vessel heaved and yawed, drifting toward the dismal impasse brewing off the starboard. Another quake pulsed the ship. The Maelstrom had all but pulled up a nose next to the Wraith, a tentacle of black lashed out to the intruding hull and wrung a leg of wood. Ioz's midnight eyes shriveled to tiny blots. "Niddler! Hurry up with the jitatan Treasure!" He rumbled over the platform. He felt the humongous brunt bash at the heel. He detected a scream. When Ioz reeled his head he descried the whereabouts and to his imminent horror, Ren had been purged into the dark water. "Niddler!" Ioz pressured with desperation. "Noy jitat! Chungo lungo!" He exploded and let out a plethora of obscenities. He elbowed at the mechanism to pull away, but the ship would not budge.

"I can't seem to find it!" The monkeybird screeched out in evident stress, overturning the deck for the missing Treasure. Ioz left the wheel and flew into self-sufficient mode. He began to rummage the ship.

"Ren!" Tula shrieked out, despairing at the ghastly sight of her cherished friend. She succeeded to scantily clasp his hand before he would be devoured in full. Her eyes delved into his terror-stricken but daring speckles of ice. She squeezed to aid him out by the arm but only managed to strain her fire.

"Tula, take the Compass!" Ren screamed to the woman he bound his wonder with. He grabbed the blue jewel around his neck with his other arm and unhooked it to throw it to her. It flattened on the board but she did not pick it up, her grip had still been immovably intertwined with the majestic lad's hand. He squirmed, suffering and waist-deep inside the dark mass. He began to sink, his frozen gleam reflected the pain in the ecomancer's eyes.

Ioz dashed all over the Wraith, the cabin and the bow, the stern and even the crow's nest. He did not accomplish his deed to recover the Treasure. "Chungo lungo!" The pirate hollered in a curse of helpless rage and deplorable sorrow. "The Treasure's not anywhere, I can't seem to find it!" He thundered out as he closely discarded his sword in a wave of hostile emotion. Niddler had tired and squawked down sadly to the wood-crusted ground. Ioz strained to help Tula remove Ren from crushing ruin, but to no avail. Niddler joined in, fighting against creation to cull the nabbed prince up by his shoulders, but his wings overburdened and he would have to forgo his strongest effort.

"Tula! Take it!" Ren blared to her from the water, the essence of a sunken spirit within his eyes. The dark water started to twist and bind him and he screamed out. Ren felt it stabbing and curbing any subsisting willpower. Any previous notion of his dreams achieving fulfillment new or old, had forever faded from his mind. Any peaceful aspiration of Tula vanished. Cold and austere reality shattered down upon him, hitting him hard with a vengeance. Confronting the Dark Dweller would be useless without the Treasure, the only weapon he held in this war. He could not imagine where it was and now, it would all be over. It pulled him deeper into the void, only his arms and head remained. Only if Tula, and Ioz, would survive. He would not have a regret.

"Ren! No!" Tula fiercely wailed to her shipmate, water welling up in her forest eyes. She devoted her vitality to pierce and whirl the water, fruitlessly battling to rend Ren and the Wraith from extinction. She made the Wraith wobble in the swinging torrent, then she faltered to weak infirmity. Ren's hand sundered from her grasp, slipped into the abyss.

Ioz spread to scout for the Treasure again, tossing down supplies and tearing the boat apart in a hectored turmoil. "I think Bloth has taken the Treasure, Tula! It's jitatan not here anymore! I think it's too late!" Ioz morbidly and morosely cursed. "Noy jitat." He expressed softly, beaten down repression seared from the inside. He let his sword drop to the floor from a hand limp with hopelessness. He steeled his solemn nerve then, reclaiming himself and the stumbled weapon. What lousy fate. He leapt to the heartbreaking ecomancer to comfort her and possibly move her. He displayed an ache in his eyes and a side of him unseen before.

"That can't be!" Tula denied, on the verge of screaming at him. "We just had it! We needed it to get here and we were here the whole time! That's impossible!" Tula opposed her hearing, which would never let Ioz say it. She refused his point, never wanting to entertain preposterous truth. She plunged to fetch the prized Compass of the man she cared for, smoldering it to her palms.

"It could have fallen in the water." Niddler lamentably whimpered.

"Then we'd still be doomed, Niddler." Ioz foretold silently with angst from his pitch, no biting remark was uttered from his mouth.

"What if Konk came aboard?" Niddler disconsolately whined, dreading the possibility.

"And escaped?!" Tula renounced the crazy suggestion, the separate concept of her mind going wild did not help affairs. "I'm sorry, Ren..." She creaked to the youthful colleague who had now embedded more than neck-deep in the black tomb. Only his clarion-blue, yet fleeting eyes and the palm which he had sustained the magic aqua-crystal surfaced. He flashed up at her one final time before being completely submerged, buried in the darkness. Horrible lashing of tendrils reared up and surrounded where Ren fell. Tears flowed down her flush cheeks. The grotesque substance proceeded to choke the hull deeper in, motioning the ship to oscillate.

"We have to save ourselves, Tula!" Ioz sieged to entice her to action, but he had been visibly afflicted himself. He aspired with the best intent able to tug on her arm.

"Ioz." Niddler unhappily gulped. "There's no where to run!" Niddler's screech resonated as he pointed to the gigantic megalith dwarfing his own standing vessel guarding the prison of filth beneath the Wraith, only a spot away from the desolate trio. With misery overpowering, the harbinger began to speak once more. "There's still hope, maybe we can go to the Maelstrom and Bloth will spare us...now that he has what he wants." He timidly suggested to the two but Ioz and Tula both shared the same disheartened look that told him this was not and never would be an option. They would all go down together with the ship. The Treasures had already been located. If Bloth were willing to destroy the Compass, he would raze them as well. "Wait!" The thought struck Niddler and he cawed out, with hideous timing.

The boat battered, being delivered into the dark water. The force of the Maelstrom had connected. The ram from the terrible bulk wracked Tula and Ioz against the railing, partially deluging the deckmates by the legs. The only memento of the prince jostled out of the hands of the sorceress, out of all eyesight. The possession sailed, resting safely on the shelter of the sunset cabin.

"Tula! Ioz! No!" Niddler squawked, hysterical and disordered. He swooped about, circling the skyline above like there was no place he wanted to land.

"Ren's Compass! Why...this is my fault." Tula grieved too late as the blue guiding-light flew from her perspective evermore.

"And I'm not superstitious, Ioz, you're a jitatan-fool. Save yourself, monkeybird." Ioz beget with trepidation, his voice had began to crack as he glinted at the ecomancer beside him with drizzled eyes. "Tula. I'm sorry for the way I treated you, it was my fault. I was a smool-brained sea-slug." His sincere apology cascaded from lips of heartache, he yearned into her lights of green. His own dusky eyes grew vast, wholly impassioned.

"It's fine, Ioz..." Tula ruefully discoursed. The two impermanent survivors endeared each other, reciprocally close as the ravaging doldrums began to compact.

"I wanted to tell you something...but I couldn't, and I hate myself for it. Forgive me, Tula. Now it's too far gone. I let my own experiences as a pirate...I should have never let it go awry." Ioz faced down, frustrated as if he would swear like normal. He stopped, internally breaking apart. This was the end. The Quest was over and all promise residing with it, all for naught. This was the terror of dying by the sea he had always feared. The ship was located an endless scope away from Octopon and any civilization for what mattered, nothing could have redeemed them. Niddler did not have wings of continuum.

"Ioz?" Tula veered into his eyes of distant black, awaiting. Ioz watched into her own swelling gawk of olive.

"Tula...I." The dimming pirate urged forward one last time before the silencing titan behind them crashed into the strangulated Wraith with assaulting tumult. It had been all that was needed to finish them off and as the red skiff with it's passengers drenched in the melancholy sludge, all stayed quiet. The sound of the enemy captain's roars and the commander's jeers were the last things the tragic three of them heard before wilting into the ultimate obliteration. The only prevailing seafarer flew atop to perch upon the overturned ship and sat for a long time.


	12. Shine on you Diamond Treasure

Chapter 11

Shine on You Diamond Treasure

Somewhere above the Dark Dweller's domain residing in Mer's oceans, a large?-boned sailor swam abound a narrow tube of coral. Strewn with leviathan remains, a pulse of gray encloaked the entrance to a dry cove where no light shone through to the very end. Stripping the amphecyte over his swashbucking mane, the man-beast Ragontok, emerged for air. He never had became accustomed to the decor that unfortunately welcomed his steaming eyes, cracked pieces from the corpses of unsuspecting wanderers. Bones, mostly of lady's hips with an assortment of mens' heads strewn in. Several womens' femural structures in particular were severed as if their pitiful bodies had exploded from the inside. It smelled clean, every spot of leftover driblngs were stripped bare with no innards or cartilage sticking free. Gaps on the shell were preserved with a film of gray glue, and any stench of bleeding decay was drown out by the reek of that alien goop. If only the shadows were thicker a bit less in the fragmented section, he could see. The glow of cold blue and a piercing shriek like no other tormented his attention.

"Your Lordship...Z.M.Q., I brought more of those sweet Shield-demons you love. In exchange, I ask a simple favor that you may...grant me more time. To do what you have requested of me...Prince of Pirate Thieves?Aaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaa-aaaaahhhhhhhhh hhhhhhhhhhh!" Ragontok presented the offering but this Immaculate god he answered to was perched on the underside of the cave's ceiling, he could tell by the drooping tail. Spiked claws inside the bleak cavern stretched to seal the bronzed calves of a warrior poised eight foot-yea in a vice impossible to thrash free.

"Stink-beetles for my snack, a good man. On this moonset I would prefer to eat you, instead." The abnormality munched through the servant with a repulsive clack as he peeled the juicy flesh from all of those bones, casually drawing it through the latched door of his teeth. He absorbed the vital fluids through the pleading tears and finished up pleasantly satisfied with due time to taste his squirming meal until unconsciousness fell over Ragontok, but Z.M.Q. faster finished off the dying pirate when he sucked the warm meat from Ragontok's intestines to the curdled blood in his veins. He incised and swallowed it all...even the crunchy skeleton he ate, except for the charred skull that he vomited out the tube it once entered. It rolled in front of Uyel's boot and to the burial pool in front, defiling it with crimson.

"Your Lordship, thank-" The grateful Uyel stuttered by sheer dread, he wondered of the monster which could cause as much suffering but his weak glance could not penetrate the perfect dark inside Z.M.Q.'s water-nest.

"Z.M.Q. is called Z.M.Q. and nothing else, that man made me chase him down with an unfortunate warning to not ever call Z.M.Q. by any other name. Do not think for an instant I sparred your life out of my own mercy. Your breed of Merrian gives me a foul taste in my mandible and I find I can only tolerate so much of you vermin. In exchange, I ask you for a favor. I will be favored for you to capture the Son of Primus and bring him to my Brother, it will make my life very easy. You do know who I speak of, Uyel." Z.M.Q.'s jet eyelids collapsed on the afterglow of a carnivorous passage. Uyel locked his joints to a rigid halt.

"Of course I know, Z.M.Q., your Lordship! I've known him for how many years...How could I not know?!" Uyel was shaking as if he were in a blizzard on the tallest mountain. "What about the dark water, how can I find the boy when it's all over the twenty-seas!?" The ugly lackey's scream was cut short by the killing panic of testing Z.M.Q.'s patience. He had felt this kind of fear in the 9's lair before but no matter where he would run, he could never be safe from this fusion with exceeding intelligence from the combined minds of above even one-hundred-thousand Constrictusii.

"You will be safe if you take voyage in Huuntar." Out of the wall the likeness of an iron maiden was summoned forth, the yellow eyes of a feline and a barbed-wire tongue's breadth long as the Crolkec-Meridol peninsula probed out of the skewered door when it let a previous victim fall from it's deadly trap. Coffin walls hard as megaton boulders, carved from hieroglyphs of previous civilizations dropped to the shaky ground with a slam.

The weapon-born, Huuntar, retracted the teeth on the spine of his body and granted Uyel painless entrance inside his hollow core. Z.M.Q. would be sending ? to a channeless isle, a barren gulf dead to water and food with no possible way to leave by ship or air.

Huuntar was a sentient torture-device, a living still crested by a leorppahd-woman's head which could lock it's passengers inside. He was not actually a man-made machine as his Lordship would imply, venis-catail technically was his genus but facts still stood. Ever since Uyel had been stricken as an eternal insomniac from a cursed pearl he had retrieved for Lord Bloth once-upon-a-moon, Z.M.Q. had played on his desperation to sleep and allowed him to take rest within the spiked monster. Huuntar responded to Z.M.Q.'s sonar. If Uyel had tried to rest in Huuntar without accomplishing his mission...

"It doesn't look very safe...but I don't really have a choice with your gracious generosity, do I?" Despite what finer task Uyel wished he could be the scapegoat of, he would soon know close company. Not the kind of company like when he would spend his early-midnight restlessness arguing Ioz on the best place to shoot craps in Janda-town from his bunk until daybreak. This was different, he would never sleep alone. Uyel's only regret was that he would never have the chance to kiss Taneuka goodbye.

"Then you will go before my life gets hard, and Z.M.Q. will take his rest. Do not disappoint Z.M.Q." The unstoppable stare bid Uyel a watching finalization. Those hunting orbs could see through every manner of darkness, Z.M.Q.'s pupils twitched in ;all directions.

PART

Long ago and many years before a prince known as Ren set out his Quest for Octopon, maiden Evelyn had been making her way across the room with a pot of tea intended to serve to her Mother, Maycaeni?Ava, a noblelady of Octopon who was accommodating guests. She shuffled her way across the room in good balance. Suddenly, the water in the cup of tea swayed wildly before she could set the platter on the table. The girl dropped the plate and cup as the tea within expelled, swooping around the width of the dining hall.

Evelyn became frightened, but to her mother it had only appeared to be a careless accident. Very upset, the noblelady ordered her daughter to her room. The girl, Evelyn, sat down and cried alone.

Shortly after Evelyn had discovered her own prowess and long before her youngest child would come of age, she walked hand-in-hand with the gentleman-heir in a forest near the palace of Octopon. Briefly scattering to pick some berries as usual, Evelyn grew a considerable knowledgeable of the nettles' soothing effects on bruises and burns. Her assigned suitor found this impressive, but by reason of untimely pressure he never dared tell her. Their chatting grew awkward, as their conversation drearily-quiet, until a bird swooped down to pluck up the blooms; Evelyn reacted and before she knew what she had done, the berries suddenly hit the breeze, flying into the hands of Rigel Primus.

She did not lose a single one. Evelyn was dreadfully embarrassed and she tried to plead to her mistake. Instead of being angry, an aspiring King simply laughed it off. Eventually, Evelyn smiled. So would begin a new era in Octopon...

PART

The sun already sinking in the skies of Mer, a deadening sadness filled the air as two ships parted ways over the sea. The overturned and evaporating red-vessel was massively dwarfed by the Monstrosity made of bones.

Niddler forlornly patted along the hull of the Wraith, which continued on in downturn, being gulped by the horrible black that swallowed his crew. Out of respect for his friends he prolonged in mourning, not wanting to move on until he harbored no floor left under his monkeybird-feet. He would miss all of them, Ren and Tula had been his best companions and he greatly cared for them both. Ioz had been mean to him sometimes, but his monkeybird heart still found a place for him too. He crinkled his head downward. After gazing into the perfect dark he wondered what he would do now, he despairingly squawked as he watched the sky for the Eyes of the Fallen Captain. He observed the ship of his enemy, Bloth, swinging away. He did not think of it at first but he considered it to be strange. Did Bloth want the Treasure on the Wraith or had he already claimed it, somehow? The evil Captain had let the Compass go down too, though, he supposedly knew where the Treasures were beforehand. It did not make sense to Niddler and he mulled over this for a while. He startled out of his speculation when his ears twitched at something, he perceived a shadow in his view but then he realized nothing had been there at all. He still had been quite jumpy from the ordeal.

Niddler screeched when he witnessed the sunlight gleaming on a shining object. It scared him, thinking it might be a creature verging on him. He had fluttered a tiny way up when the conclusion forced route into his bird-brain, a shining object? The great joyousness of hope flooded into his locomotion. He dove down to investigate. Closer to the glimmer that befell his eyes, it showed to be a scrap wedged between the boards! He set his eyes on the thing and saw that it was indeed, the Treasure. Good fortune had found him at last! He pinched his hands around the scale and attempted to pull it out, it would not dislodge so he adjusted his feet so they would clamp on the sliver and he flapped his wings with all the raw impetus his monkeybird-body could muster. It loosened at first, then it ejected with a jolt that flew him back many lengths among the sinking hull. He had found the Treasure, that was great, but he needed something to safeguard his submergence into the dark water. He fluttered inside the cabin, which had begun to drench with the black muck and shivered at the prospect of the mission in progress. He knew he would not have long. He foraged around for something, anything he could use. Success. He managed to find a tightly woven basket that was endowed with a lid just big enough for him to fit inside. Niddler toted the basket with his feet and carried the Treasure with his beak, he parked the cramping transport on top of the evil mass and crawled inside. He fastened the top securely over his crammed form. Niddler was not happy about doing this as he felt himself sink into the fatal fluid, which could only be repelled with the Treasure he held. Some had started to seep through.

Though Niddler had joined his buddy but once, he called Ren mad for it. He never wished to repeat this experience, but Niddler knew if he did not do everything he could to save his friends he could never forgive himself. He spun and whirled, declining deeper and boundlessly down into the stream of slough. He felt himself becoming sick and he tried his best to summon the fortitude to stomach it.

On the soft waves above where the vermilion ship was falling into the dregs, a leviathan-skin covered hook extended out and attached to a limb from the railing of the distressed floater. To the unfortunate surprise of the owner of the appendage, it would soon be impinged by another like it. From the tiny boat on the other end, the one-legged man with a fat face jerked a startled head up in a doubletake, and then he promptly and cowardly sailed away as arrows zipped at him. More leviathan-skin crooks reached out to lasso the sinking Wraith.

PART

Sludge of catastrophe flowed out wholly and endlessly into the center of Mer as a basketed monkeybird tumbled lower and ever more excruciatingly down. The bin that carried Niddler plummeted until it fronted to an abrupt halt. The avian from inside crimped open the lid and peered about at his environment, which was exceedingly bleak. He clamped the Treasure he had contained in his muzzle in his balled fist now. He saw the immoral element, the dark water surrounded everywhere, so he used the light of the Treasure to guide the way. To his amazement, it started pulsating and he wondered at what it might mean, so he stilled. Then, before he could get too lost in his introspection, a tentacle of cursed wave lashed out. It would have hit him, had he stayed on the way he intended on going. He stood, paralyzed in his tracks as a heinous and omnipotent presence pervaded in the cavern. "Do you seek the Son of Primus?" The conjure of pure evil fell upon the timorous visitor, sending frigid ice down the primate's spine. The area overshadowing Niddler that had been previously barren swelled with a face of blood-hue and smoldering eyes, enhanced by a wicked grin.

Niddler back-peddled in terror. "What have you done with Ren and his friends? Give them back now, you jitatan sea-slime!" Niddler yelled through forced intrepidity at the threatening plague, demanding to see his comrades at once.

The Evil being of trepidation trilled. "Foolish monkeybird, what makes you think I will listen to you?" The Dark Dweller cackled yet again. Before Niddler could react, two tendrils of dark water wrapped around his scurrying legs and planned to rip him apart by his monkeybird thighs. One more wriggled up his paunch. Niddler squawked with revulsion and thrashed feathers as the voice of cruelty reveled in a subsequent gale and then released him. Niddler dropped to the ground.

Niddler pulled himself together, though he was terribly afraid. "Because..." The monkeybird ceased. "I have the Treasure!" Niddler bellowed out with bravery and whisked the Treasure of Rule at drnge of the eminence of the peripheral.

"No!" The Dark Dweller retreated back, brutally angry. "Very well, I will show you the Son of Primus, or, what I have done with the Son of Primus!" The Dark Dweller scorched and then backed up into the lurid drainage.

"Your threats don't scare me, kreld-face!" Niddler crowed back at the vile entity, confident the Treasure he carried would protect him against any harm.

The Dark Dweller hissed with a condemning cackle. In front of Niddler appeared a mound of dark water about as large as an average man. The blackness started to melt away slowly, revealing a man's skeleton underneath. "There is your Son of Primus!" The vicious and scornful fleer echoed through the dreary chamber.

Niddler regarded the lifeless sight, saddened and unsure. "No-no! That's not Ren! You're a liar, he's still here, isn't he?" Niddler screamed and flew up at the all-powerful and attacking effigy. "Liar!" He screeched again with blinding mettle and whipped out the shielding jewel, opposing the demonic embodiment of all evil. The Dark Dweller screamed, recoiling in woe and tremendously terrified.

"Your friends are here!" The Dark Dweller atrociously spat. "But you are a fool if you think I will be defeated by a lowly monkeybird!" The appalling likeness of gloom groaned. "Where is the blue gem the Son of Primus carries with him? I told my flunky to retrieve it! I shall have a talk with him about this..." The Dark Dweller retracted, bitterly bidding his unwilling guest a doubtful commentary.

"This monkeybird is a lot tougher than you think!" Niddler uproared with power in his actions, more limbs shot after him as the Dark Dweller reveled in the monkeybird's torment. He remembered the Compass. Niddler had not seen where it had gone, but he fret. He forgot it. He couldn't tell Ren, Ren would kill him. He whimpered unpleasantly to himself, thinking the Dark Dweller may not be so horrible after all. Niddler carefully dodged around the covetous gunk and frightfully fluttered up into the air. He heard noises sounding much like a habitual pair.

"Niddler!" The invoking resembling Tula's call, flung through the catacomb.

"Niddler! We're here, monkeybird!" Ioz's relieved zeal shouted to him, it revealed itself in queue of the ecomancer's plead.

"Tula! Ioz! I'm coming!" Niddler screamed through the abysmal tunnel of dark as he glided and flipped around the tentacles ripping out for him. He wielded the Treasure in all directions, fighting to reach his misplaced crew.

Above the water and in a desolate location near a place of hidden plunder, the captain directed his officers on a large ship to prepare for an expedition.

"They are with my Master as we speak." The hiss of a cadaverous voice imparted to the giant corpulent and pallid beside him. Morpho watched out at the amassment of Black Tide in the sea beyond and then returned to the pirate Captain.

"Good." Bloth candidly commented as he reposed from the Captain's table upon his deck. Mantus, the second-in-command who poised at his right-hand angle, had been viewing through a spyglass. "Has Konk returned with the Wraith yet?" He disarrayed to his commander. "More yuugla!" He thrashed the opposite way to dictate two more saluting grunts, clenching a fist to ask where.

"Kajinga!" Mantus withdrew a perplexed interrobang as to when the Wraith had been thwarted, he focused out on a fleet of ships.

"What do you see?" The Captain required, growing ever more impatient.

"I'm sorry, Lord Bloth. By the two moons, I see a fleet of ships! And Konk, has returned." Commander Mantus visually claimed, pulling the glass down from his sightline and cast expectant eyes at the piglet who had disembarked moments ago.^

"Did he get the Wraith?!" Bloth necessitated to the commander the same question he had a moment ago, his wrath now began to rise over the previously even-temper that surmounted from knocking his four righteous foes into the lugubrious stew. "Where are the men who are to be retrieving the 12th Treasure of Rule?! We've been hove-to since the foolhardy prince fell in!" He hollered out in irritation, Bloth was having a difficult time keeping his crew together today. He arose from his slab, tearing away the remains of a monstrous steak and chucking it to the floor. "Why has my yuugla meat not arrived?!" His attention upbraided, he plunked to his chair while palming the flat and shoving a roll from his vantage.

"Shall I check on the progress of your third-course, Bloth?" Mantus evenly besought.

"Please do, Mantus." The glutton bid answer. Mantus bowed and departed.

"Sir!" The sniveling voice from behind the Captain started to speak as the behemoth before him wrung around to meet his. "Konk have news! Someone is taking the Wraith! Big ships!" Konk densely broadcast from the moorage to a rescue scout, in dread of the unwelcome information.

"What?! I'll have indigestion because of you, Konk!" The epicurean Captain barked. He was about to throw something at the stupid pegleg. "Why did you not take it?! Go back out there and get it! If I lose that Treasure and Compass now, I'll rip your head off!" Bloth roared out at the insignificant fatman below him.

"But Sir, they have many weapons! Shoot at Konk!" Konk fumbled out as he expressed himself with pleading arms, stilling in awe of his encounter. Bloth let out a disgruntled growl but gave up the impulse to kick the piglet.

"There is no yuugla left! Please!" The squealing commotion that had just arrived caught the attention of a marble eye. Restrained by the shoulder was a half-kree native standing noticeably before the Pirate Lord. Her tear-streaked profile groveled until meeting the lash of an overseeing disciplinarian.

She was forced to envy the fate of the defiant newt to her left whom at the suggestion of Mantus, was having her spirit broken by merely being strung up by the ankles and abandoned where the clothes were. The luckless villager could see the amphibian's wrists were trimmed with cords and to make things worse, a barrel of saltwater was laid where the salmon-pink fibers of hair dangled. She had previously cooperated with him for a bargain, and her payment was that he kept her alive.

"Let the fish feed us." Bloth composed a single hand-clap in response. He clout a remorseless fist against the wood and pushed out from his hungering standing.

"No!" The woman who screamed was met by a snarl. Mantus thrust her away. He resumed his station as the sobbing land-maid was forevermore carted from the anguished slave by a pair of leering men.

Delta shuffled her sore arms, on display for all to see. She had obeyed certain calls until she was made to take a leap in a seaweed crown, then she ran to avoid certain death as the Maelstrom would definitely bring.

"Arr, I'll give ye a nice raise gil-wench! I won't tell a soul where yer veil went after Bloth made yhe Mantus and wife, if yea earn us a drabul more living over the brush!" One sea-weasel ridiculed a tall water-morph draped from his narrow head.

"Aye, Delta can't hear ye. She's deaf, Lord Z.M.Q. blew her ears out with a sound-bitter...because she angered him." The handy informant let the scoffer in on a tiny spurn of caution. His fellow shiphand instantly stopped short and clutched his own throat with a tumultuous cringe.

"What is this about a fleet of ships, Mantus?" The Captain demanded as he repeated to face his second-in-command.

"There is a fleet of ships where the boy's ship was stationed." Talking to Bloth, Mantus abandoned his eyeglass a second time as he reverted.

"By my soul!" Bloth growled barbarously after strolling to the outlook-bridge. "Then we will deal with them later, tell the squadrons if they're not ready to go in now then by the oceans may I throw them to the dark water!" The tyrant amplified the malicious threat.

Mantus invisibly grunted with exhaustion. "Yes, Milord." The commander duly appeased the superior, and then parted to instruct the men. He shot a glare that would not make contact to the bellowing brute. He would also make sure a spy was sent out on the armada, for he was interested.

"Like Father, like Son, eh, Son of Primus?" Bloth digressed his focus out to sea to where his mortal enemy had perished and purged an entertained laugh.

PART

One year after Rigel Primus set out to sea, a lone ecomancer baring a crown of Octopon propped on deck against the crashing waves. She could do nothing but protect the unaware and helpless infant inside the spire, she would not let that lighthouse go down. The huge assailant on the horizon was not an illusion at sea. The foreboding hull and protruding bones, pulled to the narrow harbor. Blades met metal, two sides of the warzone charged against the other on land and ocean. The havoc commenced, and Bloth had chosen a terrible place. Evelyn witnessed the beast whom intended to seize the entire city trudging a passage through the waves to the shore, hundreds of grunts at hand. Charging the water, she walloped him into the sea. She faintly saw the sleek back of an apprentice no older than nineteen, inside a circle of men boosting him back to the enemy ship. Surges with or without blunt weapons poured out of the open maw of the disgrace.

Her tempest crashed them away.

Some men hurried for the tower and while she exerted everything within her, her powers roared in an upset flash and she could not retain herself, the Queen of Octopon made her final stand when she plunged against the magical plywood, she had fallen dizzy from the strain after the weakening rush engulfed her.

Her screams for a league of servants to shield the lighthouse was to the chagrin of the hurrying and shouting crew around her. With what minimized breath she thrived on, fading Queen Evelyn forewent futile attempts at aid.

Too late, the unavoidable leviathan fossil set sights on, and rammed Evelyn's ship.

Concealed from Evelyn, her own dear Husband and what persevered of his captured team hid inside that monstrosity. The monster retreated as he lost more than he would be able to recover again, even pirates needed reputations and she had damaged his forever. Evelyn was aware her son was safe as she slipped into the cerulean deep, two moons shone overhead.

In the very basement of a lighthouse only a limited length away from where Evelyn's ship deluged in the undertow, a scarlet woman clutched a tiny child snugly in her arms. Baby Ren giggled, not having any more clue than a seabird about what happened after the shaking ended.

PART

In a sunken place set a colossal distance under the confines of Mer, a red monkeybird steadily sailed a sporadic path by wing. The sprouting gook of devastation among the tomb aimed to engulf him.

Niddler squawked furiously. The stalk had sprung too close and scantly missed throttling him, in his beak he watched the Treasure recurrently pulsate. He stopped to hover in midair, the repulsive strand would have clout him. The abilities of the Treasures of Rule were amazing, it could not be denied. He followed the lure in the domain to a nearby clearing where he fixed eyes on a lake of dark water. He descried twain indentations in the sediment wall, both covered with the impure scourge. He skimmed over the backdrop and flittered down, carting the jewel in his hand. With his extended arm he carefully nudged the beacon into the doorway of inky substance and before he knew what had happened next, a lurid-locked ecomancer was squeezing him in a reunited embrace.

"Niddler! Am I happy to see you, chunga lunga!" Tula fondly welcomed the fluffy friend, cutely hugging close the monkeybird whom in turn squawked happily and nuzzled her cheek. She put him down and accepted the Treasure he protected, then she plunged it into the veil of obsidian parallel to her.

"Chungo lungo!" Ioz's shape became distinguishable as he stretched out his ailing arms and exclaimed his curse. "Not bad, Niddler. I think you're the only chunga-lungan monkeybird I've met that I have respect for." He discoursed of relief. "When I heard you talk about this place I didn't know it would be this jitatan dank." He conveyed his apparent daze. Scanning around at the interior, he beheld the black residue everywhere. It would have been voided of illumination ultimately, if it were not for the Treasure the group cleaved onto.

"Isn't it charming, Ioz?" Tula challenged with a quip. The Dark Dweller's domain indubitably brought her unhappy memories.

"I'm so glad to see you guys!" Niddler blissfully squawked. "When the both of you sunk in here I thought you were going to be lost forever, I was so sad, Tula." The monkeybird cooed tenderly and snuggled Tula's hand, as it then petted him.

Ioz protested with a snort. "Hey, don't I get any warm greetings?" Ioz? complained about nothing no-less, but it made the triad laugh lightheartedly anyway.

"I'm glad you're both okay, but where's Ren?" The monkeybird sought from his two friends with worrisome melody. Tula spiritlessly peered down at him.

"Ren is..." Tula began to mouth the words a hesitation strung, which made Niddler frightened as he waited with baited breath. "Let's just say I sense a great sorrow. We saw him when we arrived here, but we didn't see what the Dark Dweller did to him." Her diction said full well what she phrased was not a matter of ill reflexes, a destitute inflection bound her speech.

"The Treasure must help though!" Niddler optimistically chanted. "Let's find him!" He continued on, and the three of them channeled through another passageway of the crypt led by Tula's intuition.

"This way!" The ecomancer pointed out. The trinity of the crewmates followed another turn and when they wrung around the bend, hopes were squashed by what they saw, a misfortunate twist of events. The terribly stricken friend crept into eyesight.

"Ren!" Tula gasped as she covered a hand over her mouth. Ahead of her was the body of Ren, either deeply asleep or paralyzed but it had been unclear which. He was strung from the wall in a slouch, being retained by his arms which were wrapped and sheathed with the terminal oblivion. He appeared frail and though not bleached-white, very sallow as if numb.

"Noy jitat!" Ioz spouted with awestruck horror, his curse rung through the sunless underworld.

"We have to try to get him down!" Niddler shocked of heartache, desperation sousing his ardor. His feathers ruffled with helplessness.

Over the deck on the wide expanse of the sea of Aymara, the Captain of the Maelstrom grew restless. The superior crossly attended as his strategist revealed to him the source of prior distress.

"Bloth, the scouts have reported back to me that the entrance to the cave concealing the Treasure is blockaded by dark water." Mantus reported to his Captain, who had begun to edge on a tempo downright-angry.

"And? You know what to do!" Bloth snapped as he pointed an ireful scour of topaz at his subordinate.

"We do not have any leviathan-skin hide aboard. Our supply in the cargo-hold was torn away by the Great Wave." Mantus told his fearsome boss the news at which, the destructive one did not take well.

Bloth furiously elevated his Commander up by the throat, practically strangling him. "What?!" The notorious pillager was baffled in his hostility. "Do you mean to tell me, that for weeks, pieces of our essential cargo have been missing?!" He grotesquely snarled. "Why have you not done anything about this, Mantus?!" Ready to go into an insane rage, his glare seeped riot at the first-mate while he prepared to break a delicate neck.

"I wasn't informed! Sir!" Mantus choked out through gruff and tremorous words, fearing imminent judgment. Hearing this, his authority released and when he dumped, the battle-tactician rubbed his neck and coughed to settle from the vise-tight lock. The Captain's hand had not shut, outstretched and lingering.

"Who is in charge of inventory?" The impervious employer threateningly demanded.

"That would be Vlor, Lord." Mantus issued a desperate claim, plodding upright affirmatively. His chilly eyes jabbed at the scurvy-cutthroat who had closely sentenced him to resignation. The subject of converse started to quietly panic as the swaddling legion gawked straight at him.

"Bring him to me." Bloth ordered.? The man began screaming.

"I swear I din't do it, Bloth! I always 'd my job well, I never m'ssed up! I's one of yeur best swordsm'n, ya trust me with yaur life! Nho, no, n'o! Mantus, y're still mad abo't Janda-town, well I didn't do glawn! Yeh ain't no shipman, yhea traitoro's Eel-reed of a conniving-guud-!" Vlor panicked in demur but the myriad of bandits around him merely moored him still.

"Now." Bloth started as he grated his gaze to Morpho and without further stalling, hefted the degenerate-mule off the ground. "Tell your, Master, to clear the dark water so I can progress to the 12th Treasure of Rule! I did not leave my crew and plans in peril to be thwarted by your unethical exploits! You were to keep him there until I could retrieve the Treasures, this was your plan, Morpho!" He ?fumed, thrashing at the disciple who struggled to hiss out words. Not exposing weakness, his cognition had been agitated by the potential of this indecent mongrel he knew whom fathomed nothing to gain by ruining the alliance this soon.

"Bloth, this operation is not the same as taking down a mast." Mantus cut in before being silenced by a glower from his master.

"If my Master clears the dark water, the boy and his friends will be freed." Morpho gurgled slowly out of asymmetry, Bloth set him down.

"Then tell him to Move, Ren, and get rid of his abominable friends, or Move them all! I do not have until the Shadow Moon's blas-" The infuriated marauder boomed aloud, contesting with equilibrium.

"My Master can get rid of the boy's friends, but not the boy. Master can only restrict him there." Morpho's aquatic tongue wheezed of reprieve. "The Son of Primus is entwined with a Treasure of Rule so moving him is very difficult for my Master. Ren's body only acts as a protective barrier against the power of the Treasure." Morpho abolished the calamitous explanation to Bloth, who clenched a fist shaking in rage.

"Mantus!" Bloth irately snapped. "Where is the nearest port-town that carries leviathan-hide, and how long will it take to arrive?" He prompted ? unlikenedly, summoning for an answer.

"The nearest port is in Kalinda and that will take more than a day, also, Lord." The consort relinquished the fact certainly and smoothly. The unapproachable pirate banged his fist.

"What about the Treasure on the Wraith? Get the ship!" The Pirate Lord insisted as he bent to look down on a favored coordinator, who had been keeping his screws quite well.

"Sir, I have sent a spy to the armada that captured the Wraith, their forces and numbers are great." The second-in-command transmitted the startling information.

"What are our odds against this fleet?" The enraged Captain simmered with a creeping suspicion and the ?wrath.

"We may be victorious, but we would lose two-thirds of our men, Sir." Mantus's verbatim reply caught the ear of every able-bodied sailor in the immediate presence.

"Then we will use our back-up plan." Bloth viciously warranted, an eerie coldness festered in his words.

"This includes using the prisoners below for onslaught." Mantus knowledgeably appended. Cramming respite surfaced over the Maelstrom and then many of the men whispered and bickered. Abhorrent reactions were heard amid the air.

"Impossible!" Bloth blasted after an intangible gasp, his palid lip dropped as his nullified eyebrow raised.

"Two-thirds of our men, Milord." Mantus again reaffirmed a palling estimate.

Momentarily, Bloth let his rage deflate. "Mantus, I have successfully ruined Kalinda and many ports of Mer. Why should I believe this fleet is any better than they were? Every people and species of Mer deserves to live under my fist!" Bloth crucially hissed of ban?ful disbelief, deeming his commander's number to be blown far out of proportion.

"Milord, the people of Kalinda and other ports were beaten-down or unskilled, they reside on small islands or in struggling lands. This fleet is very large, and very powerful. It will not be easy to encumber." The advisor prudently warned.

"Twist my soul in the Abyss! I am about to at last obtain the Treasures of Rule and get that loathsome Son of Primus permanently out of my way! We must go through with the plan, no matter the cost!" Bloth surmounted with a vigor verily angry, his golden opportunity would be roadblocked. He teetered perilously on the verge of losing it.

"If you wish to attack, Bloth, then we will attack, but please be aware our spy has informed me that on the ships of this fleet are squadrons of Civilian loyalists comprised of Andorian-ecomancers, Andorian-armages, Kree-shamuns, Drajanion-riders, Biperian-martialeits, Scon-fighters, Monkeybird-rebels, Ebronian-craftans, Bentaarian-marksken, Delpha-warriors..." Bloth listened in dismay, mouth wide open as Mantus proceeded to check off the documented list of every type and class of skilled people on Mer. "We also have reason to believe some of these fighters are of the elite, possibly the best of Mer. If your wish is to attack then I will give the order, but know that any victory will be slim and it is not guaranteed. I am at your Command, so be it!" Mantus finished his haranguing backtalk with a final service? and when he did, the deck fell silent and/ the all /the underlings intensely waited with a stunned apprehension. There had been only one other occasion when something like this happened and it had not ended well, for anyone. The antagonized tactician then found himself thrown into the marrow of the mast, he thwacked his head with a sore bump and yelled a pained curse. Rubbernecking buccaneers full of alarm flocked around.

Bloth was silent for a long time in brooding animosity before he uttered a decree. "Set course for Kalinda!" With words nearly loud enough to wake demons, the infamous Pirate Lord rumbled out. "We will return." He gnarled through irate breath. "First..." The deplorable brute seethed into his speech as his cold eye of saffron glimmered of demonic intentions on a raider within the crowd. He picked out the aghast and flailing Vlor, whom the other outlaws knowingly stepped away from. Over a stem of dark water he aimed the balding pirate clad in emerald vest, and as he pitched, his mark was perfect. Whether the fellow had been innocent or guilty would not be known.

If Vlor were innocent, then someone between himself and the commander were mutinous. Clearly this fact would never be settled now, the man sunk solidly into the suffocating darkness as he screamed and clawed on an unachievible? wish to get away. The bloodcurdling blackness only lashed up and inhaled him down into massive depths, drowning out his howls until he was no longer.

Far away from where the Maelstrom floated, a stranger prospected the blotchy sea where he watched the humongous ship of bones turning tail.

"Lady! He's pulling back!" The scout announced from a ship that ferried many, he stood faithfully by the side of the captain as he addressed her with respect. To his intrigued surprise, she dashed her head to him.

"That can only mean one thing." The stringent woman's voice concluded.

"What, Lady?" The man implored her, being in total ignorance of his chief seafarer's implication.

"He made a mistake." The woman blazoned severely. She heeded out to sea at the now vanished Maelstrom.

Down below the surface of the twenty seas of Mer, three travelers mournfully gawked up at their trapped friend who did not look fit to fight, or even move.

"Come on, Ren!" Ioz desperately urged as he shook his partner, who was bound to the wall by the chains of bog. The evil goo had interlaced too much with its victim. It seemed to bece part of the young man, started to merge with his blood. Ioz often did not lose his leadership, but this was scary. Ren's very sickly and almost emaciated appearance bore similarity to Tula's condition when the Blight had taken hold of her, his dim blue were slammed closed. Ioz impelled the Treasure toward his pal innumerable times, Tula incited to use her ecomantic powers. Both of which to misfortune, failed this time. "You don't want to stay here forever! There's no salty sea-air down here, old friend!" Ioz precariously clashed to spur his shipmate to come to. "No women down here either, buddy!" Ioz sadly nudged Ren, he then recognized what he said as he rotated to Tula, ?who's face was now blushing red. Her ajar mouth clamped with her hand. He opened his mouth to clarify, but then she hustled off.

"Ay jitata-ta! I sense something!" Tula cried out immediately. Ioz at first supposed she did so to hide a pother but instead she hastily bounded off.

"Hey, wait for me!" Niddler called and rapidly took flight in pursuit, not wishing to be left alone with the dispersing bane of the Dark Dweller.

"Tula! Where are you going?" Ioz shouted out to inquire, he bolted off in the beeline that he witnessed her run.

Two humans and a monkeybird swirled through winding paths. Tula handled the Treasure and she brandished it to strike away at encircling tendrils of the nightmare that yearned to cleave to her. She tiptoed consciously when she converged on the object that had been screaming out to her, she bent down and studied the grand but thin particle of some variant of metal. "Ioz! Niddler! Come have a look at this!" The ecomancer called out as she knelt down and endeavored to pick up the object, one that was airy enough in her hands but ceased to gleam the moment she touched it.

Ioz and Niddler briskly came to rest beside her. "Great moons of Mer! What in the name of the twenty seas?" Ioz pried with bafflement, scrutinizing the architecture of the remnant. "By my Sword, I'd say that's the strangest piece of metal I ever did see!" He observed the segment. While it appeared to be sharp, it seemed to edge abruptly. Niddler squawked after striving to hone a good inspection, and at last hovered up on Tula's shoulders.

What Ioz had said created an idea for Tula. "Come on!" The enchanting woman yelled out with a sudden impulsion and lashed back to rush for Ren's boundary. She arrived with Ioz and Niddler following and she wielded the newly discovered object up at Ren. To the journeyers' dejection, it did nothing.

"What is your thinking Tula, that is a Treasure of Rule?" Ioz queried her, worrisome of the inefficiency to do anything with the item or the Treasure.

"I thought it might revive him, but it didn't work." Tula gloomily bid and glanced at the artifact, casting her eyes to the floor. She sighed and tried to focus with intent to light her spirit back to insightful capacity, then her glaze found stillness in staring at the tragedy's belt. Something glimmered in her mind. "Quick Ioz, get Ren's sword!" She stimulated to the pirate around to her who flashed her a stare and a nod, he helped to recover the weapon from the sash of the ponytailed regal. Ioz passed the helve to the ecomancer.

Tula fit the pieces together and saw the two halves would connect! They did not, however. Then she thought of another plan. "Niddler, fly me close to Ren!" Tula summoned the monkeybird companion, who then obliged with a sound. Niddler maneuvered her close overhead, allowing Tula to conjoin the broken sword over Ren's hand. To her stark astoundment, his eyes began to slide open. Ren's icy spheres drifted in her direction as if he could not distinguish where he was. To Tula's heartbreak, they shut as fast as they unfolded. Niddler smoothly dropped her down.

"What do we do now Tula?" The rigorous pirate shunted, only an inkling of hope had sparkled and then was quickly fleeted.

"It's useless, fools!" The hearts of the three crewmates pummeled gravely as they heard the discouraging scathe echo through the detestable realm. Niddler squawked affright and hid behind the legs of the young ecomancer. "The Son of Primus is mine, and he will be forever!" The wretched boom of the Dark Dweller again admonished. Tula quaked.

"Quick, Ioz, give me the Treasure!" Tula screamed to Ioz near to her, who did as she requested. "Niddler, fly me back to Ren!" She dauntlessly commanded as the dooming tentacles began to encroach upon the prey. Niddler swooped up on her mantle to allow her to levitate over the imprisoned prince. Tula grasped the parts of the severed relic in her hands and combined them with the Treasure, placing the scale between. She established it in Ren's hand and to her joy, he seemed to be responding. His eyes twitched and opened. His mouth motioned as if he desired to sound. Now he had ceased in activity, almost propelling the essence of being too weak. "Ren!" She reached out to him once more. "Please, hold on!" Tula prayed her endeared ally would cling to life as she seared the sections of the sword, focusing all her prevailing energy. Emotion churned in her heart as she pulled vitality from every iota, she begged the force to let it revive him. The scampering sirens of Ioz and Niddler throbbed in her perception, more than usual from the intense siphoning of her ability. The precarious dark water would continue to raid on the best efforts to abolish it. Terribly, she knew would have to stop soon. She felt something then, it was Ren. His lifeforce began to return in manifold, she could sense the powerful pulses growing stronger. She encountered a fantastic energy that was whirling out of control, not from her. She lit up her eyes as she fell daintily below, and had been scooped in a pair of arms. Out of the few moments and glimpses time allot her, she watched the blond pioneer. She saw his strength returned and full of vivaciousness. He slashed a stupendous and luminous blade, which collided with the shackling contamination. Ren smiled at her sparingly, before her vision whittled out. She had given him the jar to his system he needed, her work was done. She listened to the voice of absolute depravity screaming, the instant when her head pounded beyond consciousness.

"No!" The cry of pure diabolism sizzled through the cavern of the void that only illuminated by a white-hot glow. The soulless and violently burning face withdrew from the prince with the sword, away from the pirate who maintained the ecomancer, and the monkeybird who floated straight overhead.

"It's over!" Clamored the ultimatum of a strong and healthily bronzed hero. "Return us above or I'll use this on you!" Ren rallied as he brashly swung the shinning heirloom owned by his father. The 11th Treasure of Rule had gone and the healed blade now contained the magic within. It had easily doubled from it's previous state.

"I learn from my mistakes, Son of Primus!" The Dark Dweller recoiled into a diminutive crevice of the immortal recesses, constrained and cornered by the prismatic ray that would not let him pass.

"Then you'll follow our demands!" Ren unexpectedly lowered his tempo. "You were using Bloth for own ends, we know. So who is the man behind Z.M.Q. and where did he find the Treasure he gave to Mantus?" He exploited his control over the disastrous lord of every formation of the murky lava, stirring mightily for his resolve.

"Z.M.Q. is no man, but one of your closest friends. He is Zuuror, name of an Emperor and the Master of Three Blades, with his two daughters, Malkuna, and Quorzor. Liege Mizzen-Conquest did not obtain any Treasure, he sought the child of the River from Northern Blue because he could not use what was contained by the Polar sea for himself or any Merrian human." The answer came impertinent, a hedge short of overcome. The shudder of the prince's lapse and those behind him allowed the Scourge of Mer to claw itself ahead. The mask of the Dark Dweller contorted itself into a seething but defeated facade. "You may have defeated me, but hear this, Son of Primus." The Dark Dweller hissed with scorn. "When you collect the 12th Treasure of Rule, I will control nine-tenths of Mer! You will fail to own the 13th and then I will have all of Mer, save for Octopon, which I will ruin!" The Dark Dweller bitterly roared one final denunciation of wickedness.

"Your time has come, now release us!" Ren roared back almost as loud as the Dark Dweller himself, only his voice embodied supreme righteousness instead of terrible wrongdoing. He swooped and bolstered his sword to lunge at the iniquitous being. Niddler ferally squawked above him.

Tula began to stir, coming to. She glinted up at Ioz who heeded down at her with mindful eyes of nighttime. "Ren..?" The ecomancer strove, only hearing the man's voice, but not seeing him.

"Steady Tula." Ioz reassured the volatile woman. The pirate beamed at her vigilantly and stroked a piceous hair to the side of a cheekbone.

The Dark Dweller submitted to the demand, albeit grudgingly. The world then spiraled and the four spun for the surface. When the shipmates returned, they were in the same spot of sea where the Wraith had gone under. Except, the dark water no longer resided there. The heads broke through the blue threshold and filled lungs with clean air.

"Ah the sweet sea-air!" Ioz vibrantly expelled, relieved and happy to be back in the place that felt like home, away from the dismal chasm. He braced Tula, who also awoke.

"You're a hero, Niddler! We couldn't have made it out without you." Ren hugged Niddler as he cheered and warmly congratulated the monkeybird. Niddler shied, drooping his head feathers and indicated an embarrassed mien.

"Yes, Niddler. You saved all of us." Tula smiled and devotedly lulled to him, she gently patted his head.

"You've done good, monkeybird." Ioz even lauded with a grin.

"Well I couldn't just let that pungent fish-lipped dartha-eel get away with drowning you!" Niddler presented, modestly covering his insecurity. "I'm so glad you're back!" He chattered sweetly and cuddled them all with his wings. He blushed invisibly on his fluffy monkeybird cheeks. He could not help but accept that he would be more of a hero if he had not lost the Compass.

"Where did you find the Treasure?" Ioz pressed him, wanting to know the details of the rescue.

"It's strange, Ioz." The monkeybird began to theorize. "It was lodged, in between a floorboard and it was quite difficult to pry out!" Niddler recounted the occurrence. It was indeed odd how the Treasure had installed itself. The shard did appear to be so thin, but he did not expect it to be able to plow in on it's own.

"Well, whatever the case, we're happy you were brave." Ren gestured graciously and smiled, hugging his buddy once more. He did not carry on about the Treasure. Then the recollection of prior tribulation began to develop. "Where's the Wraith?" He swiftly troubled, afflicting on the probability of it being swallowed with the rest of them but he had not seen it inside the Dark Dweller's domain.

"I don't know, Ren." Niddler squawked a report. "When I went to find you it was already sinking in." Niddler worrisomely edged out. Ren appeared daunted by this fact.

Tula scouted her surroundings. Then, a lively unit in the far reach deviated into her viewpoint. She pinpointed a tiny blur of burgundy. "Look, over there! I'm getting the sense that must be it!" Tula communicated her assurance and the others paddled over.

"Hey Tula, I think you're right!" Ren breezed out as he joined in congruently by her. "Let's go!" Ren kindled forth, he dove into the pleasant blue to swim for the goal up ahead. Tula stroked the water in his shadow. Ioz waited for an interlude and then accompanied both friends. Niddler did not have a chance to dry his plumage, so he hung off Ren's embarking back.

After swimming for a numerous span, the four treasure-questers were approximating the stationary ship. The crew swept toward the coral hull of the Wraith, which clarity favored.

"Phew." Niddler let out a tiresome breath as he paddled slowly to rest, having previously dismounted from Ren. "Had I known I would be doing all this swimming, I would have taken something to eat." He disparaged as he felt himself to starting to breach upon hunger yet again.

"You shouldn't eat in the water, Niddler." Ren playfully joked, giving the monkeybird a smart smile. "You can have as many minga-melons as you want when we go aboard...wait." Awareness had hit him. "If the Wraith was sinking in dark water, then, who brought it back?" He muddled aloud, puzzled by the conundrum. "It couldn't have been Bloth or he would have taken it with him. Where is Bloth?" Ren spun around all ways and his scrutiny did not cast on the craft of his nemesis. "Noy jitat! Does this mean he already found the 12th Treasure?" The sand-haired man began to unnerve, he hated to think about the idea his observation had been forcing.

"I don't think so, Ren. I sense there's something else here." Tula sagely bid, she too was scanning the sea but saw nothing out of the ordinary. No one knew what to believe, so they moved on until they reached the salvaged ship. It had been then when Ren made a startling finding.

"The Compass!" Ren shouted with a frenzy, neither Tula or Ioz possessed it with them. Niddler did not either. "Where did it go, it's missing! I can't lose it!" He started to frenzy as he scrabbled up the side of the Wraith, zipping all over for it. He shot a glance at some other ships nearby, being overwhelmed by panic. Hints not registering with him, he instantly resumed his hunt.

"Calm down Ren, don't go overboard!" Ioz hustled out to his peer, he had climbed up the hull to help the pursuit. He dashed to into the prince's blond ponytail, which was swishing all over as it's owner commenced to scatter and knock things offbase. Niddler squawked overhead, dropping sunset and gold feathers. Tula managed a search of the cabin.

Ren finished rubbernecking into an empty barrel and craned his head upward, madly cursing himself for failure. "You need to be more careful, boy." Prince Ren heard the voice of a woman and then before he could respond or turn to see from whence it came, a hook pulled down near his neck and dropped the crystal Compass back to the rightful place. The prince whooshed in reverse to gape at the stranger. His mouth dropped open, and then an inspired admiration cascaded over him.

"Avagon!" Ren enlivened with a breath, incredibly astonished. The other three heard him, and hurried to his direction. Off port of the Wraith floated another ship, blue-gray in color and packed to the brim with so many exotic and unique inhabitants that all could not be counted. He saw Avagon adhering the leviathan-skin crook in her hands, which she drew abaft to put away. By her border, he noticed Loren and a verily-frail patron that he did not recognize. Tula and Ioz gawked at the sight forward of Avagon and the many envoy behind them. Niddler curiously fluttered down, landing on the railing of the Wraith.

"Long life for Avagon!" The hail called out from the distance. Ren detected the acquainted face of the woman with a nose piercing he once encountered in the fighting pit of the Maelstrom.

"Permission to come aboard, Captain?" The dust-haired guide requested with a smile but before the imperial venturer could react, she hopped off her own deck and onto his. Loren and a stolid guest ensued in queue, followed by a lesser shape beside the elders. Ioz and Tula stepped away a few paces in the opposite direction to make room. Ren watched from near, quite stunned. "The four of you are very fortunate. Had you lost the Compass of Rule, it would have been almost impossible to reclaim." Avagon stern coolness reprimanded the crew, but not harshly enough.

"But how? The Wraith?" Ren tried to find the right words, this amazing lady had managed to stifle every possible and mild expectation he conceived of her yet again. She regarded the way he beheld her and appeared to acknowledge it.

"I wasn't alone. I have much help." Avagon precisely clarified to her wit. She bent her head in a wise gleam to the many Merrians on the convoy behind her. There was a ship full of monkeybirds that squawked out, Niddler squawked back.

"This is amazing, Ren!" Tula revered the fleet in wide-beamed wonder, while her eyes traveled among the many people from all corners of Mer, the strange and shapely. The ugly and strong, the delicate and odd inflected extraordinarily with her delight, all joined together in unison.

"I see you've made it through the fogweed, Ren. That was the first step to accomplish. We knew you would come here, but we did not know when." Avagon carried on. "Before your father was captured, he knew a Treasure of Rule was here. Unfortunately, he was never granted the occasion to claim it." Not wishing to prolong on sorrowful triviality, she illustrated a cynical facade.

"What about the Treasure here now?" Ren craved any status with something of worry.

"Yes, what happened to Bloth?" Ioz supplemented with a jumpy tone.

"Error-in-command. You do not have long before he returns." Avagon stated firmly.

"Error-in-command?" Ren stumped on Avagon's manner of phrase, ambiguity stemming throughout.

"We assume." Avagon replied to the confusion naturally, and Ren turned a gander to friends perusing him the same. "We saw him resume voyage shortly after you were taken. We think there may have been a problem aboard when he tried to enter the area the Treasure of Rule is located, we do not know for sure." While Avagon plainly reasoned Ren evaluated this to mean his adversary must not have gained the Treasure, he also breathed a relieved sigh among his crew.

Delay followed transiently and then Avagon sparked a glance down at Ren's arm.

"By the eight wonders of Mer!" The captain practically screamed as she bent down to more closely examine the rejuvenated sword. "The Sword of Primus! You have done it, Ren! That weapon has powers one can only see in wildest dreams! How did you obtain it?" Avagon hassled the brave teen, greeting him with jubilant and stunned adoration. Plainly the dynamic between her and Ren had switched as she yearned to know more. Every impeccable detail of Ren's account the old dame invited to entertain, two men on either side of her motioned to converse with him.

"Son of Primus, my late-father spoke of this legendary Sword, it holds superb powers against the Dark Dweller. The Abomination fears it even more than the Treasures of Rule." Loren, a son to the Council of Primus and one man Ren had briefly met in Kalinda, was enlightened by ample fascination. Even in his awe, he yearned in reverence for the missing piece to the puzzle of Rule.

"Hak, he is right, Son of Primus." The unnamed legionary across from Loren and to the left of Avagon commended Ren. "I have seen your father wield this sword, but not ever have I seen the prism honed in a such a powerful state as it is now!" Dragging robes swayed forward proceeding the stringy ancient's compliment, his broadened eyes starkly marveled at the Heirloom of the House of Primus as it yielded a faint glow. Worn on his mantle, brightly-trimmed garbs of mountainous blue swished abound his buckled feet as he emerged to meet the dumbstruck prince, in line pranced a more awkward and lighter escort.

"This is Phorlock, Ren. He was one of the original Seven on your Father's council, and his cartographer. He charted the map you used to reach the 9th Treasure of Rule under Arakna island, and as you can see, he hails from the sparse nation of Qui-Qua. Once a prominent ambassador from his land, he is considered an Elite of Excellence among the best dagron pilots and combat instructors Mer has to offer, as well. Like many of his country's trained legion, he is capable of ground warfare at the speed of the dagrons." Avagon took over furthermore, introducing the skittish lad to the silver-whiskered sojourner.

"You delight in making merry, Avagon." Phorlock responded in an amused but unflinching manner.

"You're in good health, Phor." Avagon disclosed with a fervent rhythm, and albeit lightheartedly.

"Though I am pleased to be blessed with this opportunity, I have not known such a Pride since your Father himself visited our tiny, unfortunately? now extinct Civilization!" The olive elder invited an arid chill to his pardon, his voice drummed with exuberance. "Unfortunately that honorable meeting demanded to be on such dismal circumstances, I am forever indebted to your father and his Heirs." He straightened a lapsing spine, maintaining a normal posture as he focused on the fellow light-eyed. Coughs of a muted sharpness peaked from the shorter figure at his summon.

"He speaks a able of Common, rare for the survivors of his era." Avagon affirmed as Phorlock gestured a striding nod.

"It is truly an honor, Sir! Avagon gives me too much credit, I am but a lowly Knight of the Quiin nation. I see you appear taken aback by all this attention." Phorlock enunciated with civility, raising to the bashful figure in front of him.

"You, a Knight?" Ren boggled of this eccentric newcomer, it was hard for him to admit this brittle consort could be well-known, called the Best knight and aeronautics-instructor on Mer was not just a title worthy of pub-chatter.

"A respectable lord he is, Ren, I would not call for him to summon his men of Quiin but I will let him speak for himself." Avagon did not glance behind as she ?, a moment lapsed and wrought an abominable ditch, seemingly protruding from a ? depth.

"Thanks to the seventy-four tund? years Kuunda has given me of life I have become great in my ability." Phorlock resumed on cue, cycling to his original formulation. The white knight wrought control by his ensemble of officers as if leadership came natural to him, he moved like some of the best Kings.

"The Coral-Reef! Someone needs to take us out, out of my way!" Loren jumped to the ready ship affixed to the Wraith's starboard ledge, he yelled about a crucial directive as his life depended on it. The wall of fogweed covering the hedges of oceanic formations plowed into view with staggering precision.

"May I offer assistance as one of seven reasonable Captains, good man? You need to reroute three points due East if you wish to escape." Phorlock hopped over to the rearranging adult, calling inexperience when it touched Loren's breath.

"No thanks, you condescending sea-clown! I know better than this!" Loren pushed the knight away at a braggart self-reliance but instead of flying into a raging disagreement, Phorlock merely observed from a distance.

?rocks

Onlookers gawked and hurried to take the desired course instructed by the rookie. The zigzagging gusts pelted the sails upwind, driving further into the hazard. "Slow her down, quick!" Loren stirred into action, leaving the helm to batten down a lose hatch and fling a troupe of rubble overboard. The crew from the dull galleon that was secured to the Wraith's hull bounded in opposite ways, some began to wail as the deposit drew out the horrendous Krelikhan. Water splashed eternally upward as the giant arose and when the spring ceased, whole straits and channels were blocked. The shriek of dual maws ravaged the harmony, towering mountains caved to annihilation under the rupturing seaquake set into motion by the ravaging chimera.

"Murderous Moons of Mer! Tell Loren to take us back, right now! This isn't the worse thing we'll find in here!" From the Wraith Ioz hollered with a hammering heart. The porpoise abomination extended a dozen of it's thirty-two pincers, towering out of the destructive waves with a fleshless ribcage. The limiting bars of the grotesque abdomen revealed a sparkling heart that was being guarded by an alien parasite. Cringes at the volatile capacity cycled from all over the armada. Avagon lifted a leg to hobble over as the sucking current heaved and sipped in more of the bow.

"Fools follow where men do not go, but that's an absent-minded opinion from a condescending sea-clown." Phorlock mumbled a muted passage, staying out of Loren's business.

"Fine, old man! You come do this!" Loren concealed his trembling handle of the wheel under an unstable control. He backed up as the prime pilot advanced. The drip of kelp-dew worked itself by before a tentacle of the creature decimated the mizzenmast on the monkeybird ship. Dressed simian warriors began marching into the sky.

"Well, if you insist so much." The monster dove and missed in the moment Phorlock's leaping swing to the helm allowed the versed instructor to regain management of the crew. "I want every able hand on deck at Toiishok and Kuunda's arms! Protect our neighbors and do not give retreat a moment's goodbye!" His regal commands conducted the lead transport to pick up a drift away from the epicenter. The chaos began to come to order under the honored knight's hands.

"Ya, I, My lord, these are the last of our people! I only cautioned them about the coming raid upon Kalinda's shores but instead they left too late, to be caught in the Great Wave of the Dark Dweller!" The squire launched back to caution his master of the sailor shortage. Phorlock acknowledged with a nod and an alert brow.

"The people are always rash to act." Phorlock did not display tension.

"I can't sail! Yahil-! Dark water! This won't be the last of our troubles!" The squire had taken the reigns on the parallel Wraith and was failing to keep pace, hysterically panicking as he did so. Mist of scabrous waves clapped the body of planking. Ioz replaced him quickly and without pity. The excursion zoomed over white fizz from the crest of the sea, tracking a narrow maze out of tribulation. The Krelikhan screamed, intent on ripping down a ship as it churned away from the slicing tide.

"Lochide of the North, as long as I am alive I will not let any terror befall us on our path." Phorlock twisted a sincere glint to his pupil, purposefully pronouncing his promise. The superior searched through a looking glass for the trail ahead. More floaters from the armada were falling into place and dotting the championing horizon. Residents from satellite rafts were repairing damages to breached and snapped riggings. The flimsy aide balanced the walk onto his master's vessel, teetering three weapons and shield.

"What can I do, alone?" Robing swished past the servant's clunking feet when he fished for Phorlock's notice. He submissively recoiled to his own person, watching every able-bodied Quiin soldier trimming sails and rescuing all who had gone by the board.

"Fair-Flora, you have served me in every insignificant and great way for forty years and I have never withheld the Truth from you, because you are no different than I am. Trust in the light of heart, and out from darkness your peace will follow. Though Toiishok of the Polar Star may protect us, Kuunda's blessings are always earned." Phorlock stroked the squire's shoulder with a calming palm for one instant and then aired his vocals to the relief team, making sure all stranded passengers were being safely extracted from the overpowering tide. The ruddy blood-stains on the massive middle of the sea-monster's carcass swelled past five largest frigates in it's size. The beast lashed open it's lengths of incisors. It stopped as it dove. Before it could swallow Phorlock out of staring down death head-on, it spat up the pulp of mangled stones and slung it's neck. Runty aggressors with paltry tridents were pounding the obtrusive bones.

"I want everyone to assemble now!" Experiencing a loyalty revitalized, the shield-bearing supporter instructed the company and powerfully defined his expectations to the sailors as Phorlock had done. Nothing inhibited, the legion of Quiin men obeyed his orders without question.

"Is that..." One of the legionary mounting a dagron stuttered, eyes of Quiin-kind locked on the stout army of the boor race. "The Grutlamir! Our brothers need our help!" The brave rider instantly left ground and took off into the updraft. The mistral that swung over the swaying crafts tilted the sky, making his dagron slave to breezes able to massacre. "Stop the ride, I'm gonna throw up!" The pilot had not remembered his station of the world however, so he prayed for the end of his days as he began to be crushed by the regional airpaths that were far above the most hazardous and conductive places. "Quorzor, help me!" He cried desperately for a hand from the nearest man as the tornadic winds threw him. The Krelikhan chased him with one of many hankering tongues.

"Oh no!" The squire dropped his lip, squealing as he inconveniently froze from naught but raw fear. He gulped down a stickling sweat. His carrier's costume was much too heavy for his petite structure. "What makes you think I can pull you out...when I can't myself...!" In the moment he hoisted a leg over his airborne reptile's back he was a coward, but when he reached the compacting wisp on the upholding dagron he would be a hero, if he lived.

"Say-!" For a solitary dash in time Phorlock lost all sense, breaths from his spread lips stretched outward and veins pulsed cold. "I want everyone to move in, now!" He solidified with an uncompromising authority not a beat after, pointing among all twelve directives in his sight. The laboring Wraith was unfortunately left out of his tunneling of Tula's powers

"Those Konk clones can't hold off that mammoth skull-crusher forever, we have to retreat! Woman, can't you do anything?!" Ioz was entangled by the lack of propulsion the blasts were allowing, on his angle he was discombobulated by tread that was slick. Sprays of brine ceaselessly washed in from every flare up. He watched the numerous natives of the passing island of Grutlamir, attempting to fend off a bane much too gargantuan for even combined forces. The gantha-pigs pronged spears and crude hatchets, all of them flailing into the turbulent wayside with sloppy moans. Survivors cruised in on bellies to salvage.

"If I'm right, I think...it's the imp! Inside it's heart, it's making the Krelikhan angry!" Tula pounced to the ledge of the Wraith where mysterious carvings were inscribed, she adjusted her sensitivity to the skyline that was jarring like a freighter. Her own heartbeat pounded through her ears as the spell pierced inside the gigantic ribs and recognized the parasite, a reptilian bovine that was feeding on the life muscle. She pulled the ship closer, against Ioz's howling wishes. Two abhorrent heads reared for the moving platform, twenty-four tongues swirled around mast of the diverse fleet. Apocalyptic cries yielded, acidic drool rained in drops and dissolved wood. Calming virility sparkled over the feelers. They whistled, then were placated into silence.

"Hold her!" Phorlock gave a grave order as he forced an untouchable valor, about to embark on his steed to propel after the flying underling for the rescue. The knight's ally reached for the trapped cadet. Two dagron's talons entwined and they spun through the clouds, spinning in a union of tails. All hope was lost, the Quiin patriots would be separated and would fall to their deaths. The rive chanced between the pair and then split them apart, crashing them down to each deck. Both the lives of the squire and midshipman were saved at the ebb of the guzzling whirlpool. Phorlock dismounted and scurried to his squire, the rumble of the departing behemoth plunged him into the company of the fervid questmates. The slender ancestor rolled and plopped down next to the prince's boot. He could have broken his neck but when Phorlock was booted from the ashen clipper, his end was astoundingly unscathed.

The squire swiftly scaled the mast to scout for any invisible chance of defeat. "Captain Phorlock, it's leaving!" He certainly notified the major supervisor at his standing. He signaled to the Wraith's crew for them to synchronize with the guiding line on Phorlock's craft, which was now sloshing away from the reef at the confident hands of the the Grutlamiran nationals and the remaining Quiin tribes. Ioz fixed the spindle under the auxiliary mount, allowing it to play secondary to the galleon. Jumping fish sparked by screams from the Krelikhan whooshed past, joining in a rainbow of streaming droplets. Cheers from every deck melded into a singular band of celebration. Phorlock engaged the short-skilled league to retain direction for an area known as the Biperia Bight. The moored assemblage trimmed for stay.

"King Primus used the sword you now hold. He fought the Dark Dweller with it himself, the edge became medially destroyed due to his actions. When he returned, only part of it remained. I see you have found the other half. Which is amazing in itself, but I have never seen it glow the way that it is now." Avagon was indubitably astonished as she told her tale. Ren could not know where to begin.

"He used it against the Dark Dweller, that's where we found it. I couldn't put it back together, so I used one of the Treasures of Rule on it!" Tula divulged the story, but she did not yet comprehend what she was saying. "I used it to rescue Ren! The Dark Dweller ensnared hold on him so I used my insight to..." She travailed on nervously, not sure how to relate. "It revived him!" She finally confessed, she humbly diverted her face down but she did not realize that the others stared at her with idolization.

"So, maybe it is true!" Avagon blurted out, genuinely astounded. "Young one, do you know what you have done? It is wonderful!" Avagon caught Tula. The ecomancer gently roamed her green eyes above, witnessing the old woman's overcome reaction. "Maybe I should start from the beginning." She conducted, fathoming a penchant to skip ahead of herself. Ren and his company watched and awaited. "Your Father had always said that the Key to unleashing the true powers of the Sword of the Treasures of Rule was an Ecomancer's touch." Avagon unveiled, gladdening and laying a quiescent palm on Tula's shoulder.

"But that can't be! I'm no hero, I just did what I thought could help Ren." Tula started up as she regarded the superior lady with amazement. She did not quite accept it for herself. After Ren shied a grateful twinkle at her she was bound to partake of a grin, despite the nervous sensation of jitters in her.

"Nervous about your calling, Tula? It can't be that bad, you're the only woman I know who can make Mer revolve around you!" Ioz observed with a flat pitch, illy standoffish.

Tula said nothing. She knew that whether Ioz meant well by his comment or not, he could not have understood.

"But Tula, you are. It is true. I believe Primus even saw that in your Mother, Ren. It was unfortunate that Evelyn did not join your father in his Quest. If she had, I think he may have stood a chance." Avagon wistfully explained. Palpably, she was in disappointment at things that could have been. However, the mention of Ren's mother roused his interest.

"Avagon, I would like to know about my Mother. You've mentioned her before. I want to know more about my past." Ren stood forward to bespeak her. Tula stilled by his side, entangled with his arm.

"You mean you have not found out, Ren?" Avagon was comprised of a radiant bewilderment, fairly surprised for Ren. The young fortune-hunter shook a no with his head. "Then you will know the Truth." She started with a smile. "Evelyn Primus was a beautiful and smart woman, very kind and very full of warmth for our world." Avagon began to explain as Ren nodded with understanding as the four listened intensely. "Though she grew up and was raised in Octopon, she kept a secret. She possessed ecomantic abilities, the Control of Nature." Avagon enunciated, she could view Ren and Tula's eyes expand and then signal in a noticeable meeting. Niddler heeded her in close captivation, thirsting to hear more of the fascinating story.

"Dream? Is it about Octopon's history?" Tula's soothing whisper sung over a hazy teen as she sat to his left. Ren kneaded his drowsy neck, stirring circulation to the blood vessels he much needed on the stiff bed.

"I slept like a baby." Ioz stretched up and genially sighed, slumping off from Niddler on his side of the cot. The sun's glint abode in sliding through the porthole, he tapped it to be sure their hosts were aware of the dawn time. Ren took a rest in the creakiest matress, not the one assigned for himself by the generous legion. Incurably, boarding a large crew meant for tight accommodations. Tula relaxed in the comfy bunk as she returned to the middle of the room and bound up in the covers.

"I sense something evil beneath the water." Tula's pupils shrunk, her cold calm shook from out of the deep reaches of her mind.

"There always has to be something like this." Niddler rubbed his elongated neck sadly, groggy after not having snoozed well. He moaned at what the ecomancer's nightmare may entail.

"Can we get those chungo-lungos to grant us a damper on the noise from that rickety foremast, since it's oh so kind of them to grant the Wraith free-repair around-the-clock? Kuunda willing they'll cut down on the racket after sundown, or I'm switching beds with Tula tonight." Ioz groused when he plucked his hilt from the nightstand, he cast a loose shirt on the blade of his torso and trekked for the door.

"What kind of babies sleep like you?" Tula repined on the unrefined swashbuckler's lingo. Saying that any of them slept decently was ludicrous, and she hated it. Her hallucinations grew stronger, screams blared louder. She wanted to scream herself but she was drained from her ears to her toes.

"Don't you tell my secret!" Ioz walked up with a yawn and opened the cabin door to what he imagined was the chamber-pot, instead Phorlock's squire punted him out from the doorframe like modesty was the most important matter on Mer.

"Better hold it in, because the pot is closed. I knew there was something wrong with that squire." The thought of breaking in a new lavatory crossed his mind but Ioz was a gentleman, and an unkind one. He nursed his temple and rotated on the sore bed to nonchalantly sleep once more.

"Ren, don't go in the water!" Tula drew into unconscious images of creatures created on the underworld's rim of Mer. She hid unescapable lengths from this life forged entirely on the outskirts of the living ocean, detecting a single breach above the bottomless pit of the Dark Dweller's domain. Something was trying to dismantle her, she was going to die on this Quest with splattered sweat and blood.

Worse, there was nothing Ren or Ioz could do about it. No one could stop it. No one.

"Tula, it's morning. We have to start the day, Avagon needs our help. Ioz will be waking up as well." Ren nudged the sleepy enchantress and mouthed a scolding miff at the grumbling teammate for giving her lazy ideas. "When we finish the Quest, I'm going to take you to Octopon's Star Meadows." He promised in her dulled gaze.

"Why?" Tula rustled to a nauseous condition. Ren had never suggested this before. She couldn't gather control of her mind, her ecomantic radar impinged on a devastating sonar-signal, letters filled her void. Z.M.Q. Z.M.Q. Z.M.Q. Z.M.Q. Z.M.Q. Z.M...

?"That was no dream, Ren." "Tula, on the other hand, you've swallowed too much sea-water." Ioz swung the cabin door.

Z.M.Q. was no human, but wasn't exactly a monster.

"Because I want to." Ren imbued a blue sentiment at her unwitting rejection but his attention livened after another demand of 'don't go in the water'. "What's wrong with you?" He compelled the woman who was sick, for a temporary spell he would have considered whether she may have been suffering from a bride's agony if he had not known that was impossible. "I guess we're not waking up today." He sighed and settled by the Andorian beauty's dampened hair and drifted off.

"Like Jazhea's eels in the ceiling, I'll wager?" Tula blurted in, bizarrely remarking on the subject. She bumped curious Ren a shoulder nudge.

"Young ecomancer, don't speak of things you don't understand!" Ioz imitated the cartographer brusquely boring a sharpness in temperance, to the stun of his unsuspecting audience. It was actually Phorlock's fellow Captain, Mizar, whom disappeared. When Mizar was set on returning from hiding the Treasure of Rule under his watch, he had gone to a place only the elder knew of.

Phorlock once feared for his committed friend, Vaecusa, for she may have tried to find the lost Guide of her House by her lonesome. Ioz cleared his throat in a compossed egress as Phorlock had.

"Maybe we should have let him finish. I don't think Phorlock is an insane old-man, nor do I think Jazhea is raving mad or untrustworthy because she was ravished by these Death lords from those legends." Ren drew a disagreement at his co-mate's unexpected rashness. Ioz shifted disconsolately.

"You're right, I don't think she was ravished by the death lords-she's just stark-raving mad and untrustworthy." Ioz agreed for once.

"Oh come on, Ren. Jazhea is more than a bit strange. I tried talking to her before, but she is like ice." Tula at last toned down her nerve, picking up a peculiar sensation.

"She did say that odd thing. Unless she meant the kind of eel Ioz was hit with, which means she'll..." Niddler squeaked with shrewdness.

"That's not what she meant. She's not a goner, not yet." Ioz roughly muttered, earning him deviating glances from many others.

"There's more to this than what we know by far. Let's try not to be impatient and maybe we'll understand." Ren carried a load on his chest, stuck he was of the few signs in Octopon's history attained by the Quest and his father.

?

Avagon's voice resonated sonorously amid the biding air. "You see, Evelyn Primus did not know it. She was raised to be a noblelady of Octopon, which meant she would serve the Royal family in the best of manner. She knew she controlled abilities a civilian maid did not possess, but was ashamed of them. This was, until she met your Father, Ren." Avagon resumed narration.

?"Lady Avagon has all the answers!" Loren

Upon the floating ship, Avagon continued her anecdote. "Evelyn and Rigel Primus fell deeply in love. Rigel saw greatly in her potential and conversed seriously with her about it, encouraged her to practice on her own even. He wanted to marry her. There was some debate over whether Rigel was making the best choice, many in the house of Primus considered Evelyn to be a mousy woman, and did not find her worthy to be the Queen of Octopon. Rigel however, was as sure as he could be. He wanted to marry Evelyn, so he did. Those were the days Evelyn was a friend of mine, a vast deal of time before I left with your father on the Quest and the sadness settled in Octopon." Avagon morosely depicted as she endured on.

"You told me before my Mother was important in Octopon. If there's anything that can be learned that will help me on this Quest, I would please like to know." Ren mentioned the dowager's past words, asking for more about all the details that had been essentially bothering his inspiration's oath.

"She was, very much so, but the entire story is a sad one. One even I did not even hear about completely...I knew about her ecomantic powers? and her role in Octopon as it's protector as I was with your Father on his Quest at the time...I am not sure if knowing will help you in the future but if you wish to know, I will tell you what I can." Avagon diverted her sight downward and began to salvage her chronicle once more, but this time she suspended her motion as if something had been troubling her.

"Avagon." Phorlock's durable invoke projected into the ?context suddenly. Avagon addled at the forbearing call. "I think we should tell Ren the full story." The Quiin knight judiciously preferred, Avagon indisputably could clash with this prospect.

"Full story?" Ren wondered, emboldened smile brodend, wishing to know more. Avagon pondered.

"Phorlock returned to Octopon after he hid the Treasure in his charge from Bloth. Unfortunately, he found in it's place much dismay." Avagon told an individual interpretation, her manner showing sorrow.

"Dismay?" Ren sought fastidiously.

"Her capabilities advanced with intense diligence, Evelyn many a time had used her gft to protect the city of Octopon from becoming desolate. She was so powerful with her nature-binding skills Primus even trusted her enough to rule when he left on his Quest. Before you were born, the attacks on Octopon had already begun." Ren cast down in mourning as he noted her reminder, knowing what she recited of.

"Great Son of Primus, before I aided the former Prince of Octopon on his Quest, I did not believe studying the historical Treasures was my original purpose for this world. Rigel Primus heavily researched the Treasures of Rule with no delay and by the time he had taken the throne, I was ready to seek closely with him. He looked later into the incident of the Black Tide, scouring for any knowledge he could. He told me of his discoveries, at times." Phorlock commenced to illustrate. "During that time however, he did not know another sought his wisdom. Bloth, at some point in? era had docked off of Octopon's shores on isolated business of his own and learned by some means what your Father might have found out about the Treasures." He concisely paused as he reflected, the four crew maintained with reception.

?"No Quiin definitely knows how. No one was harmed when he hunted down information on your Father's whereabouts, Rigel at the time was visiting the nation of Andorus. However, the Pirate Lord caused a great stir within the city as did the enemies of Octopon's throne, and Ours. Octopon did not rest easy that day." With a noticeable lapse in memory Phorlock softly mentioned.

"Then you're the same Phorlock I've been told about. What did my Father do?" The Senior lord had sensed his nerves and behaved like he could read Ren's very emotions, the uncanny acumen of familiarity crossed his mind.

"You will have to forgive me, young Ti-Prince, there is only one of me, though I am many else. For your question, your Father saved my life." He started callously, fluent with a distant pitch.

"How?" Ren pressed him to continue.

"Very long story, helpful if you know some history of Qui-Qua, first. Our homeland was often pilfered by pirates from an enemy nation, Valjen. The Land of the Ruthless, as we native Quiin often refer to it. Their annihilating shores were partially ravaged with dark water, many of us believed the inhabitants would raid Qui-Qua isle to procure loot for their own dying home. Qui-Qua itself was a small land, but full of boundless Riches. Our soil naturally contained many hard-to-come-by materials within it's (five)six ruling districts, steel as well. You may know one of these materials as Aksort, wood from the same tree comprising parts of that boat of yours." Phorlock cleared his throat as the shipmates exchanged glances.

"Land of the Ruthless, why? I've heard of the Valjen, they inhabit an island sunken to the South Pole of Mer. Near Guuda-bay, isn't that right?" Tula suggested knowledgeably.

"That is correct, but we prefer not to speak of Guuda-bay if you would please, Fair-One. They are called so by us because their raiding parties are nothing to bet with. The best of our Dagron Knights only serve as a distraction against the worst of their scoundrels, and should they still exist in such prominent numbers they would stand a chance of crippling Bloth and perhaps many nations of the world. Though the mis-mutants do not live in an expansive realm, they are bloodthirsty fighters. With the exception of a few, most stand taller than you, and I." Phorlock painted a melancholy picture. Standing to a height usurping Ioz, the Sire regrettably basked in displeasure.

"Valjen raided Octopon as well, as I remember from Jenna's stories." Ren surmised as he had been imparted. His brothers and sister were taken without regard from Octopon's borders and boarded in foreign lands...

"Ah, yes. Part of the reason I knew your Father was because of this, before the brash raiding-parties had evoked the nerve to ransack the Jewel of Mer, they hunted on Qui-Qua. The rivalry between ours' is strong. Qui-Qua was a paradise until decimated and We, the Quiin-Draconiks are a proud and flourishing people from an ancient civilization of rich culture. We, the generative Quiin, are Protectors of valuable treasures and Predictors of the Moons, but Valjen see us as nothing more than greedy conmen and superstitious gypsies." Phorlock imbued a sour argument, ruddy lids concealed the deepset eyes where the skin was thin.

"Don't forget, Yahil, our neighbors, the kree, were an optimal help." Shrillness degrading from the accompaniment to the counsel's right-hand side attested to the statement.

"You are right." Phorlock hinted his surprise as he paid heed to the narrow man, who had decided to grant his faith.

"I don't think we've been introduced to your friend. He's a shy matey, is he now? You are?" Ioz teased the vocal outsider in the occasional placid tone.

"Siyerr's squire, greetings." The graceful sound of a welcome was touched by a forced gruffness, verbally higher than Phorlock's scratchy rhythm but of Quiin accent. Phorlock fastidiously laughed.

"A very good Squire will do his tasks well." Phorlock was evasive proximately but laid a reliable hand on the tender sideman, instantly removing it. "Where was I, ahh yes. Once the Richest nation on Mer, Qui-Qua was immediately under Octopon in Wealth and Growth. However, this also made it a principal target for enemy invasion. Valjen pirates sought the Nobility in particular, with the aim of extorting the vast Riches from which our Home needed to thrive. They succeeded in kidnapping the queen of the original Sovereign district, who was with Heir at the time. They detained her and the new Arrival for many weeks before the Royal family was forced to pay a hefty ransom for their safe return. The queen had returned with her Ookhaat pouch from Valjen but was unable to resume her Call due to what ill-effects the crippling plague caused to her body on enemy estate." The awkward knight was more bothered than he may have wished. He slunk on the bend of crooked knees, a pair of manus nimbly stabilized with sportive sandals.

"What kind of plague? Dark Water!" Ren crackled with a guess.

"No, we do not think so. What horrible thing had befallen her is still not understood. After Our Queen's incident, and Valjen's many failed attempts of hijacking in-between times, a paralyzing plague fell over our Kingdom. Our Nation would soon be in shambles by the aftermath among it would awaken. Valjen had taken everything from the Aristocracy. Left no scrap." With abstemious words Phorlock revealed a cacophonous tragedy.

"So, the royal family of Qui-Qua was eradicated?" Tula imposed intuitively as her curiosity drew.

"No, everyone survived. However, We can not say the same for our Northeast region. We lacked enough morale to keep our island politically stable, even from our neighbors, the Kree's steadfast Northern-Dwarve, and Tundroaic Tribes. The assault was all too-powerful, for it brought the entire population to a standstill. Our once lovely Nation fell into turmoil while I was blown out to sea and marooned by myself on the banished island of the Yellow-Eye. Stranded for weeks and with my supplies gone, I wasn't sure if going back would be wise or possible, for I was armed with no knowledge of how I arrived.

Among Our suburbs, it is commonly taught the Eyes of the Fallen Captain are a play of the sky cast by the Evil Spirit of Malkuna's Son and will only appear to those chosen by Death in a shipwreck. I had taken out my bond of kutlack Serum, but then I spotted his ship on the horizon. Not knowing that it would be the Reputable King of Octopon who would grant me passage on his journey, I poured out the vial-" Phorlock had been interrupted in the midst of explaining his circumstance.

"Wait, isn't Kutlack the most lethal poison in existence?" Tula interjected hastily, she inhaled with agitated breath but did not receive instant word. "I know about Kutlack from...somewhere or someone, such painful effects." She became nostalgically aware as the conversation processed.

"Maybe we shouldn't have interrupted him?" Niddler chirped to pardon Tula's hunch, but he was startled at the revelation.

"There was no need to interrupt, but yes, Viva-flora, it is. Very rare and indeed not easily found, it is occasionally forged in the Teyuat grove where the spell-binding Saqtie-stars grow, a plantation exceptionally difficult to navigate. I find it interesting that you know of it, as only Imperial Quiin Admirals and Valjenite-outlaws regularly use it. It is not poisonous to the touch, so it is often dreadfully mistaken." Phorlock expressed more detail, in the midst of being talked out of turn.

"You are curious, Tula, the Valjen smuggled plant growth from the heaths on Qui-Qua to their own island and there they were able to produce the Kutlack pods four-fold, but their docks near the bay could not hold Saqtie-trees. So, the valjenite crootaks were only able to create a bogus strain of kutlack by planting the seeds underneath geographical algae-beds, where the eels fermented the roots..." The eager squire was sophisticated in speech, but his accent was tapering to a trebled disarrangement. The Wraith's crew gawked at a concise male draped by a periwinkle regalia akin to Sir Phorlock's. However, the sienna squire's face was shaded from the nose up by an affixed hood of lavender instead of the rich-orange of her surrogate's lapels. He timidly folded two sets of clawing palms to allow Phorlock to continue.

"I always carried a vial with me as part of my duties, but disposed of it into the sand because I did not Will taking the chance of anyman happening on my shame. Arhem. That is also how the Valjen produce their kutlack, Brilliant of you to explain such fact, man." Phorlock peered disparagingly at the shrouded partner of his beckon, apparently shushing him one final time with a nod. "I joined King Primus on the ship, surprised when he offered me a place on His Quest. Though it would not be until two-years later he intended to set out, I would stay in His Majesty's inclusion at Octopon Palace. Such a rare and Honorable grant, even for a personal acquaintance. I sent word Home, of course. I did not hear anything back from a time after I was informed all had been well for the refurbishment and replenishment within Our colonies. Only one tundroaic year had passed when I finally heard transmission from Qui-Qua, that Our Central-Temple had completely fallen under." Phorlock tipped his turquoise eyes shut, envisioning the day when he learned his prime lesson of Life.

"Why? What happened?" Ren desired continuity from Phorlock. He concentrated with a willing fuddle on what secrets Father could have discovered by allying with this weary and yet strong defector.

"Because the Sovereign District fell into tyranny. The ransom-accident decimated not only Our rare jewels in the realm where I lived in service to the people of Qui-Qua, but the relations with /it's pretentious families as well. 'At this time I was powerless to do anything, excluding with the help of King Primus, who assisted me in the trouble my Words caused. I remained with your Father, offering my skills with map-making and unencumbered combat-experience learned throughout my palace years." The unquestioned patriarch concluded of a vicarious recount.

"Combat experience? Phorlock, the Quiin-Draconiks were superb warriors, is this true? Maybe you can join us in our escapades with Bloth, forgive the need for aid on our Quest, we sure could use a lot of it." Ren mediated on previous facts, his inquisitive impulse sought more knowledge of the lanky frontiersman at hand.

"No, Ren. Our Honored people are designated to help you when the time is nigh, but that is an ill-conceived notion. Combative-Sports are considered Luxury and leisure among our Well-born. We primarily live as a peaceful race. We rely fluidly on our Wisdom and Perception. The inborn gift of the Quiin-Draconik is to Divine a man's Desire, as well as his Hindrance. We may Know any a servant of Kuunda, but only if he wishes to Know us." Phorlock defined a passionate heritage, he eyeballed the refined youth with a keen consciousness. Ren scratched his head.

"Wisdom and perception, sounds like Tula's mark, eh?" Ioz rebuffed with a brambly remark, eying the voluptuous counterpart who was, more or less leaning against him indifferently. "So, your legions must delight in breaking your backs." He began to take a brittle liking to the parental partisan as he went forth, but he would wait for a sign of favor while he placed his entertained glance on the jagged broadsword attached on the knight's shoulder-guards, and below to the knee.

"Be my guest." To Ioz's quiet shock Sir Phorlock unlaid the weapon from the hand-woven scabbard and invited Ioz to lift it, as if reading his mind.

"Chunga, it's light." Ioz flipped the blade more agile than his own, admiring it before returning it to the olden soldier.

"But no less deadly. Ruukaana is an airy metal, heavy weaponry is not needed when fighting at a speed of Ten-Gales. Draconik composition can of course bare heavier, but it is an easement in battle. It would be My honor to provide you with Our armaments, but regrettably stationary stock is short. By the way, We do not bend the Flow of life like your Fair-friend. Divining is our Specialty." The helpful aide of Primus admitted. The squire tinkered to stay upright while equalizing three-different sabers.

"So, you'll look at the stars and tell us if our ship is going to sink, or our sails will melt on the way to that 12th Treasure? You know, man, you look someone I know." Ioz rejected the concept of star-Sorcery but strained to place the resemblance written on the triangular forehead.

"You may want to ask my squire for Divining purposes. He is quite smart and diligent, moreso than I. Who do you know who I may resemble, Ioz?" The squire grinned at the compliment as Phorlock's waiting ears absolutely expected recognition, supposing this was not the only incidence outside of the Quiin's isle he had been challenged this way.

Ioz gawked at the spiked pauldron on the siege-ready confidant's left shoulder. The sides of his cheekbones were profoundly angular in a tribal fashion of his race, but noticeably withered from years of hard battle. Phorlock dressed in antiquities with the composure of a Shadow Moon Chieftain, light feathers and jewelry splayed among the threads of his hair, as well what was prospective to be highly-valued eyelets along the nose-quills. The wide mantle overlaying ember-trimmed armor bore a back-dropping regalia of the Aqua sun, Toiishok, shielding his crest and shading his tiered hair. "No one, my mistake." Ioz retracted his hunch and shrugged it off.

"Phorlock, did you happen to bring any food from home? I'm starving! Is that gold? Or a piece of Janda-fruit tied to your Pirate's beard?" Niddler dove forward with a hungry squawk, motioning to the elder's peculiar loops of grey. The quills were very thick, looking to be impenetrable to everything but a sharp cutting-knife.

"What may I help you with, accomplished monkeybird?" Phorlock stolidly encouraged the nearby and hankering avian. "Ah, a tradition. To grow the berd)quills around the scalp's crest is the best-professed guarantee of manhood, for the Draconiks. I don't think you'll find my beads of gold to your taste." Accordingly, he acknowledged the lingerer by stroking the bearded crown of his mane that was strung up to the above pinning of his billowing locks.

"Until a sprinkle-moon we spent our days upon the West coast of Kalinda, divining our next strategic excursion. Our own food supply is gone, you'll have to ask Avagon, Niddler." Phorlock's squire offered, meek and slight of gentleness. "It also may be helpful for you to know...you have a rival with one of his four limbs in his earthbound-soul. He will help you, but only after the Merriest and Brightest of you answers his question. Are You A Good-Rich, Or A Bad-Rich?" He suggested an esoteric prediction. Only boggling brows greeted his riddle.

"How old is your squire?" Ioz tapped Phorlock in a friendly gesture, observing the fragile but mature semblance. Unlike the golden-beaded and ornately threaded whiskers Phorlock possessed on the margins of his square jaw, the squire boasted not even ringed-strands under a bare nose.

"Younger." The keen smile was almost traced on Phorlock's lips when he appraised the crew in all honestly.

"Phorlock. Did you know someone from your home who told you what had happened, after the invasion of Qui-Qua?" Ren wondered as an idea strayed. He had been somehow reminded of his own circumstances, and something else as well.

"My first born. She did not tell me what happened, but she told me the Truth." Phorlock allowed Ren some words, not entirely making his meaning known. "Very important it is. When our oceans are plagued with foul souls like Bloth and Z.M.Q. it is essential to know one's enemy, even anonymously."

"The Truth?"

"Such men could overturn every ship with the Treasures in-hand, and Z.M.Q. injured me well, but loosing an arm is not the same as loosing a neck." He was prone to a sigh, but incidence decided otherwise. For the first time, he rested a four-pronged hand on the prince in a fatherly shudder. Ren moseyed his eyes away from the protruding shoulder-blades that naturally dissolved under shallow skin whenever the knight moved his arms. The squire's mantle was hidden under layers of armor, and seemed to be innumerably clumsy in trying to balance the emblem shield.

"Does your squire need some help carrying something?" Ren pried as he edged a glance on the now-composed assistant. He touched the even symbol of Qui-Qua on the airy but unbreakable plate. Like a loose knot he traced a diamond line, the Northern loop of a broken infinity-cross in red.

"No. He does not, unless my squire has the ability to become someone else." Phorlock watched the witty helper demurely cough and stabilize, he listened to Ren.

"Like all Imperial kings and Emperors, we are a true people, you see. Such divine kings are folly for mistake. Often times, the Truth does not need to be hidden if it is told upfront, but a wise man must learn when to speak and when to be silent. Though my great chld's deeds were of our Truth, she should not have put them into words. The Truth can be corrupted like anything. We often do not lie, we tell the Truth. However, the Truth is not always a good thing to tell. It can be a very destructive thing, if used for evil. I'm sure you will soon learn what this means when you experience the many dangers of Mer I have faced. That is the best advice I can give you, aspiring King of Octopon. There are times when it is best to say nothing, you will need to know when these times are." Phorlock's disciplined and cryptic phrase finished the personal rambling.

"Please tell me, if you know of the dangers of Mer, what is this purple mist on Octopon's terrace we've heard about? Where is Z.M.Q. in this, and what does he have to do with Liege Mizzen-Conquest? Is Z.M.Q. not more than one person? Zuuror, the Master Bearer of Blades, and his two daughters? Were they from Qui-Qua?" Phorlock practically leapt back with a jounced maw at Ren's ardor to quench his wisdom.

"Aye, tell us about Z.M.Q., why that barnacle-chugging sand-leech. If I knew who that depraved yellow-belly was I'd shred every last bone from his spineless aft and feed him to a pack of leviathans, as would anyone." Ioz puled on with a distastefully-expressive lust for wrath. Phorlock's spheroid glance deflated on Ioz and glared unfavorably in rapid pace.

"I thought Ioz was afraid of Z.M.Q."

"Ren, I don't recommend your crew try to learn Z.M.Q.'s identity and his whereabouts or it will bring grave danger upon you all...Z.M.Q. is surrounded by many men and most have never seen him. However, if you must, I have once known a Quiin rumor that claims Z.M.Q. as the legendary Polar Prince from eons ago. Apparently, he is the son of a ruthless queen and a foolish emperor. The Polar Prince was transformed into an invisible monster with his wife, Malkuna, and son. All three poltergeists were cursed to spend eternity preying on Mer's humanity through every generation but Zuuror was always chosen to be the Shining One's closest friend, so says the Legend. No more questions about Qui-Qua, I'm afraid. We must find out what you have discovered." He stiffly changed gears back to the more important matter. Ren felt a trace of obscurity.

"After Bloth's first raid those who knew of your Father's Quest could do nothing more but pray for the best as he continued to pursue the Treasures of Rule on his own evil whim, including myself. The Moonsail Festival was a different kind of snare. Twelve years ago I saw to the night's precise preparations. Everything had been going as planned, that was when he returned, expecting us. We were ambushed."

?part

"As it turned out, the signature was forged...by some strange magic...or some very close hand." The worn captain cardinally fringed upon a flashing memory of raining sparks and disintegrating wreckage on the Day of Fire, uncannily crunched by his own discipline. Niddler had strikingly unsettled from his spot and bustled to Ren's side. Ren's recall fuzzed out.

"What about why Joiquiva and Lus-nayi's village was raided? If it wasn't because Bloth was looking for Jazhea...then who, Ren? Why did the orphans disappear?" Niddler slivered the silence as wood screeched on the highs of the lengthy bulkheads. The monkeybird was displaced here, unhappily burdened to subsist on pickings not ideal for living. Though he dwindled not a peep on how his feelings were likened for Joiquiva and Lus-nayi it was slipshod but obvious he missed the playmates.

"Can we please not talk about that right now, Niddler?" The allusion of the girls' he spun his back at, but soon Ren's choice to seal his mouth was nagged by a tune of why not. Ren summarized the importance of giving the dilemma a portion for thought. Noises from outside cut short any delicate fact. The four spiraled topside and jumped the Wraith's

"I believe this belongs to you. You did drive away the Krelikhan, so it's yours. It is the Guyfoo-capsule. No one knows what is inside of it, you are it's parent now that it is detached from the monster." Phorlock dusted himself off, presenting Ren with a conical spore and a surrounding animal.

"Guyfoo-Capsule, is this another legend? How are we supposed to keep it safe from the monsters chasing us?" Ren refrained from inspecting the dinosaur that seemed to permanently carry the egg in it's mouth. Because it was as obese as a miniature kelp-cow, he could barely lift it himself.

"It's not keeping the Guyfoo-capsule safe you need to worry about, but the protector of the Guyfoo-capsule." Phorlock charged of Ren as he motioned to the pudgy animal. Ioz was uncommonly letting Tula give him a hand with retrieving himself from a slip on the water-blotched planking.

"Keep it on the ship and raise it? Sure, why not!" Upon resuming his sealegs Ioz threw up his arms in surrender of the next venture. He weakly growled and stared back at the floating away sedge, such a natural pitfall for so much peril.

"Joiquiva and Lus-nayi wanted the Guyfoo-capsule! If only they were still here..." Niddler reminisced of his perished friends.

"Mer has become so mean since the dark water took over. Their assistance on the Quest won't be in vain." Tula's reminding visions gathered about the Imbibers, but she was also led adrift by the twin sisters and their terrible story. Anyone would be afraid of the high-seas if they knew what Joiquiva and Lus-nayi had undergone. It was tragic news to hear the island they now lived on was completely swallowed. Very sorry they were such a tale ended that way.

The orphans he found an adoptive guide for among a woman who had lost her daughter and desperately desired company. Ren had imagined the task of finding Joiquiva and Lus-nayi a new home would have been more trying, but it was love at first sight. His better surprise stemmed from the hint that Ioz was sad to have them gone, in their later days aboard the misfit begun to warm up to them as if he were a kind of spirit-uncle.

"I did miss the food." Ioz insisted on his reasoning for longing for the Quiin Draconik girls, but he sometimes was seen listening for their distinct giggles or the cute rolls of minga-melons during lunchtime.

"So we're near the Oracle, right?" Niddler nosily chimed in with a puzzled gape.

Ren had been averse to sound for a moment until a significance entered his head. "Do either of you know what my father knew about this Treasure, below the sea?" He challenged with the idea. Unsuccessfully, he was greeted by shaking heads.

"Unfortunately not, and Avagon only knows the recent information from my farflung experiences. Your Father stored his notes some place safe, though we are not sure where he may have hidden them. He called them the Chronicles of Octopon, I believe." Phorlock defined in an equally mystifying and analytical note.

Before Ren could say anything else, Ioz excitedly interposed. "So when are we going to get back to finding that Treasure?" The brisk pirate incited, edging to go. "Though with the size of this armada it looks like you could take down Bloth yourselves! If we go after that blue-lipped leviathan, I don't think he'd stand a chance under the two moons!" He shouted with an intimidated stare of esteem at the measure of the fleet.

"Though our numbers may be large, pirate, I'm afraid we can only assist Ren in his battle." Avagon disappointingly informed, allowing subsequent gawks to unfurl on her.

"But why, Avagon?" Tula pleaded of her, not understanding.

"It would normally be my will, dear child, but Bloth is a more powerful and dangerous enemy than you will know. Only the Son of Primus with the power of the Treasures stands a chance to save our planet from all matter of destruction as Savior of Octopon." Avagon inspired as she beamed with a delay in her speech, her pitch had become confident as she rested a reassuring palm on Ren's shoulder. Then she inspired recalled memories of the River and Treasure within him. "There has been no time in the current history of Octopon when Bloth has not been alive." Avagon advised with a stormy conviction. "Longer than Rigel Primus and his father ? been alive, longer than Teron has and longer than his father before him, Bloth has been sailing and plundering the twenty seas of Mer." Chills could not be prevented from trickling down the spines of the four when Avagon wrought the outlandish reality, a halt was drawn before she carried on and leaned down to face Ren. Phorlock swiveled to him as well, the sage lifted up a hand in a signal to the prince.

"Mak Toii, Ren!" Phorlock shouted to Ren a phrase sounding much like a battle-cry. Ren only peculiarly peered at him. "To honor, Ren." Phorlock interpreted as he granted the prince an emphatic smile and an angular nod.

"Oh, right." Ren uttered nervously, he felt a tinge of recognition.

"As we say on Qui-Qua. In this case, may it bring you victory." Phorlock waved with a tutoring value and nodded his head.

"Wait, Ren, one more thing!" Avagon directed and she twisted around yet again to her command her crew. "Ren, you will need something to help you go below our ships to the next Treasure your Quest will lead to." Avagon then stopped him. She inclined to the leagues behind her and shouted an order, she caught an amphecyte in her hand. She handed the leech to Ren and as he readied to equip it.

part?

"I'm ready to return the Treasure, Avagon." The spry? prince abode as he suited up with the oceanic gear.

or

Someone passed Avagon something that resembled a belt, but on closer inspection it appeared to be a sheath. "Take this, Ren." Avagon genially assisted Ren, she delivered the item to him with a bend and he graciously accepted. The heir annexed the scabbard at his waist and enclosed his blade. "May the Gods protect you! Always the Quest!" Avagon called out to Ren through her hands and she waved, the young man grinned and dove into the water.

"Hey wait, don't we go in with him?" Niddler prompted, curiously fluttering his feathers.

"Not this time, friend monkeybird. Below where the Treasure lies there waits a passage only wide enough for One to go through." Avagon explained as the others agreed. Conspicuously, Ren's friends could only hope the young shipmate would be okay. Toward them Avagon whisked to a curve of her posture and beamed. "You may be wondering what we will do while Ren is gathering the Treasure, we will prepare for his upcoming success. First, there are many here with us who want to see you, my friends." The crew watched her and awaited as she promulgated the news.

To their profound glory, many spectators leapt over the ridge of the ship. First beginning with a verily-weathered sorcerer bearing hair of a coral shade, then two figures with locks of dark.

Tula's eyes lit up. "Teron?" The ecomancers were bedazzled by and toward the orange-haired aide.

"Yes, Tula, and it is time for you to learn of the four elements of this world. It is the key to unlocking your potential to become a true ecomancer." Teron glinted with a mentoring greeting to the exuberant novice.

Then Tula set a gaze on the other two. "Father! Brother! Is it really you?" Tula ecstatically radiated, astounded as she embraced her relatives with tears in her eyes. The older of the sable party picked her up and warmly twined her in a parental hug. "I can't believe it's really you! I thought you were both gone!" She rung through a heartfelt expression, clinging tightly to her relations. Then she backed up. To her awe, her father lifted a hand and a fish rose suddenly out of the water to encircle Tula in midair and then dove back in. Tula was overwhelmed with joy.

"No, my little sea-flower, as you can see our ecomantic abilities have increased manifold and we are now ready to return home." The loving father gleamed down at his affectionate daughter. "I see you have grown so much, Tula." He wavered with a smile. Tula blossomed happiness in return. She did not realize it, but she had indeed flourished throughout the span of the Quest.

"What happened to mother, and sisters? I haven't been given the chance to know if they're okay." Tula warily invoked of her father, he responded positively.

"Don't worry, my sea-flower, they are safe. They have gone to the island of Bentaar to take refuge, along with the rest of the Andorian people." Tula's father beamed, placing a comforting hand on his child's shoulder. Her face still puffed with tears of beatitude.

"Niddler!" The florid monkeybird spun abaft and listened to several avian conjures calling out to him. He scanned above and to his wonder, there were his brothers!

"Lella? Kuffa? Ruuko?! I thought I would never see you again after you were sold!" Niddler cawed with unfathomable bliss. His brothers were alive and here, despite being divided from him at birth. He watched the diverse flock of the orange and blue tracing a green-colored monkeybird. He saw them whoosh down for a landing, and they all chattered together in chipper assembly. Dello and Kellon fluttered down after that time, joining the monkeybird convention.

Ioz felt something grand lift him off the ground from behind. "Scot pango!" The burly pirate flurried, flabbergasted as he flailed his legs. Someone ample put him down and he swept around. "Zoolie!" Ioz bellowed with delight. "What are you doing here, you bar-bellied mudworm?" Ioz cheered aloud with a reunited and friendly jest.

"This big fleet of m'lady Avagon's came barreling into Janda-town." The red-whiskered man laughed wholeheartedly. "I couldn't just let such an opportunity slip away." Zoolie revealed with a wink as he ripped out a cutlass, he tossed and caught the weapon with a swift juggle. "I told Maars to keep watch on the gamehouse." He admitted in a coy whisper as he leaned over.

"Ay chungo!" Ioz whooped out in jubilation. "I'm glad you're here, old buddy!" Ioz yielded him a humorous chuckle until he felt a sting. Zoolie punched him in the face. "Chungo lungo, what was that for!" He loudly cursed as he nursed his cheek.

Zoolie paused and stared at the cohort in front of him as if he were genuinely outraged by something. "For nearly giving me a jitatan heart-attack when I saw your ship capsize after that lowly barge of a darva-worm's knocked you in!" Zoolie excused with a smile. Only a moment later, he and Ioz broke into a fit of laughs. Then there was a shout and Ioz found a pair of arms wrapped around his neck, which caused him to stumble over backward with a thunder.

"Big brother!" Solia's zest summoned from behind. She had evidently launched off the cabin to ambush him. Zoolie rolled in a fit of hysterics.

"Noy jitat! Watch it Solia! Shut your bellowing mouth, you swollen sea-mule..." Ioz swore and fussed again as he sat up and rubbed his head, which had jounced on the way down. "Chungo lungo, aren't we a little old for this." He mumbled inaudibly.

"Sorry, big brother!" Solia astutely snickered as she let him go.

Zoolie chuckled with another flip of his weapon. "That's enough deck-paddling. We shouldn't rough him up too much, we may have to fight at some point." The barkeep evoked, to which Solia grudgingly agreed and Ioz muttered.

"I guess you're right...but your gold is mine later!" Solia singsonged as she threw arms around her older sibling, squeezing him a big hug with a broad grin.

"Tula, Teron has something he wishes to tell you about and show you, two elements of light must be mastered to conquer the element of chaos. I'm sure you'll catch on quickly but you may need our assistance, it's very important that you pay attention. It will be your truth in aiding this imperative Quest. Lift your arms, yes!" The prime nature-wielder instructed his listening daughter, the quartet of ecomancers gathered. The sparkle of glistening snaps began to float overhead of the Wraith.

"So...where is it?" Zoolie ruffled Ioz by the collar, expectant in his larking lip.

"Where is what?" Ioz flinched with bewilderment.

"The 50 gold pieces I loaned ye back in Janda-town, bucko." Zoolie presented a cheerful reminder.

"Oh...about that. I lost it chum, but I can pay you back with...!" Ioz fumbled on his excuse, instead socking Zoolie in the frizzy temple.

"Watch it ye rudderless dock-rat, or I'll have to heave ye off! Ye know you still owe me a grub-fare as well as the drabul, bud." Zoolie heckled from wrestling Ioz with a headlock, which the brazen buccaneer nimbly slipped out of.

"Don't mess about that Zoolie!" Ioz stunted for an instant between his spars.

"Who said I was messing?" The tavernman vaguely threatened.

Ioz stumbled backward. "Chipungo!" The pirate howled as a crackle of fire burst in the sky. Tula laughed nervously as she eased her stance.

"We come into port for fame and dame-cheating so if you don't like our game then you better raise me a glug to forget my name or...by my sword! When sun's over yardarm on our cabin-crib the slugs will be eating, so pour me a mug for my faraway maiden in...Janda-town!" Ioz sported a grin like he just didn't care, he danced an evasive jig and raised a jug to fill.

"You've got the right stuff, Ioz!" Zoolie chuckled as he tussled the pal a tipsy bowl-over, he shoved the cask between their barrels. Ioz's hankering cup thristed for juice.

"Let them enjoy it now." Tula shrugged as she sat a peek at the two wistful fools climbing the mizzenmast by the power of brew.

"Avagon, how did your fleet navigate the dark water to come here?" The ? ecomancer admired the lengthy stretch of sea-vessels.

"A good question, but in this case, one with an easy answer. We took the bypass!" Avagon peaked her head to the skies above as few more ships tailing in the line floated into the blowing breeze with the aid of manifold dagron-riders and monkeybirds. It flew into the lofty current of the Aymara air to blast through the rush of the wind and plopped down into calm waves. The stationary fleet in the tide wafted, anticipating the prince's return.

In the cobalt sea below, a youth fluttered his legs to swim boundlessly deep toward his target.

Ren eyeballed a rather plentiful flux of dark water that occurred to be guarding the entrance to a cave. Without hesitation, he drew the Sword of Primus from the sheath and used it to slice through the provoking stain. He flowed inside the tunnel which led to the cove and he stayed to the pathway. The black grime cleared from his route as he conquered the brink ahead. He checked around for any danger. The inlet compelled him upward and he surfaced, out of the the water. He removed his mask and inhaled a hasty breath. The area before him appeared to be a flat rockface with nearly nothing he could see except the scopious and rocky ceiling above him, ridden with stalactites. He urged out of the basin and then he focused on a noise upon scanning about. "Who goes there?" Ren supposed he had heard a shout gambol through the cavern, calling out for him. The silent prince saw no one.

"Ren! Son of Primus! Prince of Octopon!" Ren answered back, rotating in all directions. His voice reverberated through the cave when he felt a tremor. In the middle of the cavern, he spotted a gigantic elevator-stone emerging from an empty well. The massive circle halted to a stop as he backed up, the rumbling then ceased. He laid eyes on a strangely-shaped man who was very heavyset in build, decked out in heavy armor and wielding a hulking sword in a stony fist. The head bore an adamant helmet of horns. The face contained rough features and was seemingly fused in a scowl. Next to the beastly likeness and in the center of the base, stood the most outlandish form of a creature Ren ever had seen. The thing was towering and huge, taller than Bloth even! Though, it was not as imposing in girth. It looked to be a human, but it amassed two heads. One was like a man, and the other appeared to be the head of a predator comparable to a shark. On the left side were scales and webbed feet, like a sea-creature. On the opposite, the limbs appeared like that of a person. Ren receded a glance to the right side of the extravagant creature and the horned-man. He witnessed someone he recognized, King Obrik! Lord of the Atani. "Your majesty? King Obrik?" Ren's great vision of blue skipped as he expressed himself aloud, unquestionably speechless.

"Son of Primus?!" King Obrik formed a doubletake as well, gaping upon Ren who had previously entered the chamber.

"What are you doing he-" Ren and Obrik were about to ask the same question but before they could, the lifeform in the heart of the mobile platform charged at Ren with fearsome claws and gnashing teeth. Ren hurried within a split-second and drew the Sword of Primus to block the precipitating blows, but before he would have to strike, the brute stopped. The lips of the manly head started to create an expression.

"Welcome to The Oracle!" The human head graciously received the visitor.

"Welcome to The Oracle!" The fierce head clashed.

"So That is who you are!" The body of twain personas bid Ren a curious inspection as it boosted him up and sniffed him, it behaved as if it had gained new and exciting comprehension. Then it proceeded to return him to the floor.

"Greetings, Son of Primus! How may I be of service to you today?" The gentlemanly head addressed Ren with a cordial bow, so politely and diplomatically in greeting that it would have been ridiculous to believe it charged only a moment ago. The fellow smiled, undeniably welcoming. "My name is Et." It benevolently alleged.

Ren slowly blinked his ice-blue seers. This was probably the strangest thing that had happened to him by far, or close to it. He alternated for a moment, then lowered his Sword. "I come here in search of the Thirteen Treasures of Rule, I was hoping I might-" Before Ren could finish talking, the other temperament began to gnarl to the one in prior regard.

"I was hoping I might kill you and eat you for lunch!" The facade of the shark roared down at Ren in a signal of his menacing movement, doubtlessly very vicious. Ren's mouth dropped open and his eyes grew full with terror as he backed up, readying the Sword once again. Before he could attack, the human spirit sounded.

"Stop that!" The chivalrous-half shouted to the face of the shark. "We must not offend our guest!" It barked demandingly, but with dignity. The human identity of the dual personality arced to Ren. "I apologize." The formal twin proclaimed again. He bent Ren a polite one-armed bow. "My partner can be quite..." He drawled to think of the right word. "Beastly." The pleasant character defined with a charming smile. "What is it you wish, Son of Primus?" The elegant head smoothly besought of him.

"Uhh, right." Ren simpered out, he stared at the odd mutation with dilated eyes of aqua. Moderately, he settled down and retreated his Sword. "I seek the Thirteen Treasures of Rule, I believe there is a Treasure here and I was hoping you could tell me anything you know about it." Ren plainly clarified, now with a forced quickness before the other side started to dominate again. Out of the corner of his eye, he saw it growling to itself and looking away from him.

"Oh! The Thirteen Treasures of Rule! Of course!" The well-mannered side of the Et agreed with a gleam. "You must find the Oracle. Though it is said a Treasure of Rule is here, I unfortunately do not know exactly where it is." The man grinned and engaged his seeker with an understanding and disappointed enunciation. The ferocious essence flared up to argue, so the conversing head lashed his attention from Ren. The hominal disposition regained control and exchanged with Ren once more. "Is there anything else I may help you with?" The human smiled and offered helpfully.

"N-No." Ren managed to stutter out. "Thank you." He civilly resigned as he bowed his head, he rapidly lifted it back up. He noticed the two idols contending again. Deciding not much good would come out of this, he effected to slink away to where Obrik and the copious barbarian stood. Ren was in quite a dilemma. He roamed to the two others and saw that to his bafflement, they were feuding as well. "Obrik?" Ren beckoned with a curious circumspection, wanting to know just one thing about what was going on.

Obrik instantly pivoted his head to Ren to communicate with him. His red eyes focused upon the inquisitive lad. "What is it you want, Son of Primus? My business does not allow for much chatter." The king cautioned him. The rival he had been bickering with said something, to which the monarch dashed a glare to. His eyes told he would deal with the bother momentarily. Obrik shifted blood-hued orbs to Ren.

"Obrik, may I ask what is going on here? I'm seeking the Treasure of Rule that is here. Do you know anything about how to reach the Oracle?" Ren delved openly for instruction. He hoped to reap some information from the King, but his task in question seemed to be far more preoccupied in fighting with the man exactly across.

"Ren, I don't really have time right now but I can tell you I do believe there is a Treasure of Rule here, though I do not know where it is. We are indeed inside the Oracle. Perhaps if this brainless slob would stop quarreling with me, I could be of more service to you." Obrik sharply dismissed as he cycled his stare to the brutish identity opposite him, who retorted.

"Why you colorless piecsa lanky sand-bilge!" The unwieldy man blasted at Obrik as the King's mouth gaped indignantly. He threw up his arms as if he desired to pound the pale regent to a pulp. He then cast a peek at Ren. "I've heard of ya Son of Primus, on a Quest to save Mer are ya?" He quizzed Ren who nodded timidly in accordance. The rugged-framed inhabitant marked him with interest after seeing him reply. "I'm Chief Tor, leader of the Scon." The sunken and sluggish drone presented his introduction with an appealing smile. "I'd be able to talk to ya more but this spineless piecsa rock-scum has it out for my neck!" The Chief savagely growled at the magnate across from him, who frazzled in gale as if his integrity were insulted.

"How dare you!" King Obrik bellowed at Tor. "You have no manners at all!" The crowned noble raged, fluttering his hands like he could not see straight. "We've been going to this same underground channel, from Aymara to Kalinda and Biperia to Bentar, for decades trying to negotiate peace with you mongrels! Our people put up with your litter, your abominable filth! On our land! You should be so fortunate we don't destroy you as we speak! I don't care if the dark water is taking over Mer, you impervious..." The king was gritting his teeth as if he were boggling for the right word. "Beasts!" He abode with his abasing anger. "Don't deserve to live among us, you creatures! If you could have your way you would spill your filth all over the twenty seas! Nevermind the truth that you continue to diminish our food supply, from the only trade-route the Eyes of the Fallen Captain do not befall us because of the Maelstrom's senseless wreckage of our carrier-ships! From the look of you cretins, you have quite enough to supplicate your insatiable guts!" King Obrik proceeded to rave but he did not swear, likely not wishing to reduce himself to his sentiments of the Chief before him.

King Obrik's words only further enraged Tor. "You jitatan scrawny! Sun-fearing! Worthless kreld-eating bag-of-bones!" Chief Tor roared at the Atani King, raising a sword overhead. "There is no food ya kreld-necked schoonie! There hasn't been for weeks, the tradeships can't get through anywhere because of this smilge everywhere...all of Kuunda's children are starvin'! If you'd come outta your grungy hole every once in a leviathans' voyage you'd see that the dark water is everywhere under the jitatan two moons, an' Bloth's been wrecking your ships since the year of the black tide b'cause you don't share with anyone and believe in apocalyptic folklore, ding-bats!" Tor boomed and he clipped up a stone, slamming it irately against the ground with an aggressive fist. In a second incite, he pushed the King in front of him away with two beefy palms in such a method that could have toppled the albino over. "You're lucky I don't killya right now! Your people are the scum of Mer, borca fools! You take away land that can't be taken back! Turning it into your trashy sand-coated waste dumps! You and yer people don't deserve the honor of swimming in bilge and if I could, I'd get rid of ya all!" The lord of the Scon blustered in a crashing outburst and cleaved his blade above as Obrik threw out hands and backed away. It was then when Ren stepped in.

"Whoa, whoa whoa!" Ren stood ahead of the Chieftain to block the line, putting his palms out and trying to reason. "Let's not do this." He issued kindly. "You need to work this out!" He called for the two opponents to cease the dispute.

"I would be happy to work it out, Son of Primus, if this senseless and barbaric slob along with the rest of his swine-people would stop filling our land with their huts and rotten fish-kills, which they make no attempt to clean up!" Obrik established to Ren and cringed at Tor before him.

"I would be fine reasonin' with this yella-bellied waste offa slime-eater if he and his sand-swallowing people would stop marring our land with their senseless buildings and carvings'!" Tor absolved with a contemptuous response.

"You need to settle your differences!" Ren shouted out. "We don't have time to fight about things like this, dark water is taking over Mer!" Ren desperately sought to dissuade the warring leaders and to his appall, they both bluntly shoved him out of the way and continued to squabble. "Noy jitat!" He cursed at his setback, stroking where his cheek had been jostled. Essentially, he needed to find the 12th Treasure of Rule. He could not go back without it, he didn't have time for this. He wondered where it might be. He perused the solid walls on every side. It then transpired to glimpse over at the Et whom was still arguing with itself. It was fortunate the personage had left him alone for now but he did not know how long such an abnormality would last. Suddenly, a concept occurred to him. The Et was the reason why Obrik and Tor were fighting! Somehow, someway, Ren would have to will them to solve their disparity.

Very torpidly, Ren bordered the Et. He discreetly verged forward, as not to goad it. He handled his sword in a readied position to defend himself, but not to strike. "Et." Ren called aloud as the dual-headed creature swiveled to him.

"Son of Primus?" The human head hearkened to him with a jolly beam.

"Stupid boy, I'll rip you apart!" The vulgar head of the shark snapped in his direction but Ren bravely stood his ground. Then the two sides again started to brawl.

"Eet!" Ren shouted again. To his bemused fortune, both faces bent to look at him. Ren began to articulate. "The two of you are brothers, you shouldn't be fighting like this!" Ren's words rang with directness and concern for the resisting sides. The paired heads attended to each other. "Shark head, I know you are angry at human head for interrupting you, but you should know he is only opposing you because he realizes you're making foes out of yourselves. Please, shark head, save your valor for the real enemy. Man head, I know you wish to persuade but enduring conflict to express your reason will not help! Dark water is taking over Mer and if you spend every valuable moment arguing with each other, there will not be anything left to argue about. You both need to come together as brothers! If not for anyone else than for your own as a whole. Focus your energy on defeating the true cause of your pain! Not each other!" Ren appealed as resolutely and eloquently as he could, driven to pacify the divided entity. To his wonderment, the duo abdicated from the row. King Obrik and Chief Tor observed Ren as well, noting his valiance to stand up to the Eet. He had even pocketed his blade. In awe and bewilderment, they watched him. Then each ruler turned to focus on the opposite man.

"Do you mean that, boy?" The crested duo of the Eet challenged in unison.

"Yes!" Ren professed and bowed his head to the presence before him, a long pause followed.

"By what means do you suggest?" Eet guarded the central contour, awaiting answer.

"I'm not certain. I think it is asked." Ren stood still by a far delay, at last solacing in the deed.

"Then you have passed the test, Son of Primus!" The fusion of twin voices sung as an amazing rainbow-light glowed before him. It spiraled, spinning into a black and white duality and then one of blue and red. The Eet appeared again but now with only one head, the left side of the face contained an eye of red and to the right, an eye of blue. There was a lucid shape of a diamond-formed crystal implanted in the center of the renewed forehead. The Eet synchronically lifted both arms up and loosened the gem, then it receptively handed off the trinket to Ren. "Because you used Words instead of the Sword and have brought Us together, The Treasure of Rule now belongs to you, Son of Primus. It is the Treasure of Unity. Also, as payment for your distinct action, you will be granted this knowledge. You are invited to the true Oracle of Eet. Of the might of the Biperian seas...your soul reflects this destiny." The Eet's reunited forehead flashed of a double spectrum around Ren as the brothers transferred a phantasm. Ren blacked out.

Black skies of quietude faded into view over waves near to a rocky peninsula, a vapid lad strained into consciousness.

"To the end of Our Quest." Ren shuddered his worn lids and enjoined his vow. He placed his hand with the other two men, designating a triad.

"For friendship between every man and every woman. We'll fight for Captain Ren, until our days are done. Or let Kuunda strike us dead." Ioz made a final bold sentiment.

Ren glided away, the sour terrain evolved to the familiar.

"Unity is a key. Use it well." The now individual soul of the Eet ceded last words before it completely vanished. Ren smiled at his accomplishment. He drew his eyes at Obrik and Tor, who were no longer belligerent, but paying mind to him instead. He strolled over to them.

"Ren, we have already settled our differences." Obrik appreciatively started to compose. "It is because of you, we now realize what fools we have been." Obrik pronounced as he rested a hand on Ren's shoulder and the prince restored his head to eyeline.

"Yes, Ren." Tor supplemented, also laying a palm on the boy's corresponding shoulder. "You've done good Son, you've shown us for the fightin' idiots we are. I just hope it's not too late and we haven't done too much damage." Chief Tor evenly expressed and met a glance with King Obrik, who nodded a head.

"Yes." King Obrik affirmed a second time. "Truly you are great, Son of Primus. Tor and I need to be heading off now. You have reminded us of what has truly been ailing our growth, not our differences, but lack of respect." Obrik exalted Ren and retracted himself back to stand next to the Scon leader. "I wish you the best of luck with your Quest, may the many great Gods of Mer protect you. As king of the Antari people, you are once again welcome to our island, should you ever need refuge." Obrik bid the prince farewell as the two rulers resumed to leave the way they had come. Ren pinched the Treasure in his palm and smirked. Then, the cavern started to shake.

Ren rushed for the exit, but then he realized he could not go back that way because the amphecyte was gone. He then scouted around and saw a compressing doorway of rock to his left. He groped through the passage and as he vacated, he collapsed within the sea outside the sanctum. Quickly, he was hefted up by several people who were settled on the Wraith.

"Took you long enough, Ren. Did you get the Treasure?" Ioz interjected as a flirtatious Solia poised next to him, just eagerly grinning. Ren proudly held out the polished diamond-flat, which resembled a piece of very lustrous glass.

"Oh, that's a beauty!" Avagon stepped close to Ren and admired the enchanted gem. "You should be very proud of yourself, Ren. Now you only have one final Treasure to collect." The winter-haired guide reaffirmed with beaming eyes.

When Ren had begun to converse further, Teron and Tula walked forward. "Ren and Ioz, I would like to speak to you about our young ecomancer's powers. After our return to Octopon I believe Tula would do well to come with us back to the free regions of the enchanted Isles of Daifey. Our ancestors trained with the runes of the Dybun forests, which were connected by root to the original Viva tree, long before our nation lived on Andorus. The area is highly conductive to life magic and I believe it will enhance her abilities manifold. Of course we will not be long, but I think one month should be sufficient." Teron proposed his chary deal, accompanied by a bevy of reunited ecomancers.

"Magic runes? Bilge. We need Tula to finish this Quest! Bloth is-" From nearby, Ioz turned to the imminent party with a sour dispute. Tula appeared to be upset, Ren shot him a perturbed scour.

"With Avagon's wise discernment, we believe Bloth may have made a fatal mistake. I see much potential in Tula and I believe honing her potential will prove further crucial. We need more time. If you do not allow her to advance, I fear our very quest may be compromised. The most powerful place we can take her is of course the Viva Tree, but Andorus is a farther distance from here. Though Randor Runes created by the Viva Tree will enhance an ecomancer's power, they will easily break and be rendered useless when used in any changeable location where the possibility of disturbance is high. If Tula tries to train here, she will fail as I did upon being captured from my journey through Miragon. This may be the only opportunity. Please consider." Teron compellingly argued, not willing to bend on his instinct. Ioz crossed his arms as he pondered.

"Please, Ioz?" Tula begged for herself, displaying a full sense of need. Ioz sighed.

"Two weeks and no more, or we set sail without her." The tough buccaneer at last relented, to Tula's joy. The novice charmer embraced him smilingly. Ioz made a hard expression and watched away, not showing his weakened drive at Tula's thank-you. Ren laughed. Tula delightedly hugged Ren, she introduced him to her family whom had come aboard and they greeted him with open arms. Niddler was still catching up with his brothers from Pandaawa so they did not disturb him. Ren gleamed as the company swarmed around him to give him words of praise and procure a glimpse at the Treasure, but Ren saw another problem he needed to attend to before his day would be done.

"Who is this...friend, Solia, is he older than I?" Ioz glinted a sneaking clue at his sister from home as he downed a mug of casked ale.

"No, he just helps me pay for fruit is all. Only he actually buys for me, my friend, the gambler. So easy when he is around." Solia denied any association her brother suspected, but Solia never paid for anything. She winked behind the rugged seafarer's back.

"Solia." Ren called the name of the slightly embarrassed lass, approaching her.

"Oh, Ren. So I heard about the Treasure you obtained, I can say enough how brilliant that must be." Solia hid a blush as she casually tried small talk with the prince. For as long as she had known Ren she was fond of him and even enjoyed flirting with him, but she would have never expected him to regard her in the same manner. She suspected a trace of interest as he came forward.

"I was hoping you would consider staying at the lighthouse when we touch land. You could get hurt wandering through towns and stealing for live, especially if you're alone. I'll talk to Jenna and make sure you have enough to live on until you can go back home." Ren promptly engaged Solia in a different matter.

"O-oh." Solia was fully blindsided and perceptively distressed, such was a reaction she did not expect from Ren. "I'm afraid I can't go back home, Ren, the dark water has swallowed Tayhoj completely. Mother said so in her letter to Ioz and I. Don't worry about me, it's not anything I'm not already used to." She pawned off her insecurities with a smooth melody as she wrapped her arms seductively around her crush's shoulders. She was also reluctant to give up her freedom but she knew Ren made a good point, she was simply used to her lifestyle of wandering alone.

"Even if you are on your own you should have someone to see or somewhere to go, that is why I would be grateful if you seriously considered my offer. Ioz doesn't talk about his fears but he cares about you, Solia. He feels responsible for running out on your family and I know he would feel a lot better if you were someplace safer instead of alone in port or on this dangerous journey with us. That is why I'm doing this for him because he can't do it himself. You would be welcome to stay for as long as you need to." Ren gracefully solicited his request.

"Hrph! Well in that case, he should worry about himself. Thanks Ren, but I like being on my own." Solia seemed insulted at the mention of her brother thinking of her as a child, though she was thankful he cared about her. He couldn't have possibly put Ren up to this. Ren was doing this on his own, but for what reason? She and him had scarcely interacted.

"Do you want to be a running wharf-rat until you're stolen from or kidnapped by pirates? If you want to steal your gold, you'll have to fight for your share. Doesn't sound too rewarding for one glass of ale at the local tavern." Ren all but left the thief girl to her decision, carelessly watching the setting sun in admiration.

Solia's nerves tremored, she remembered the incident when Konk had tricked her out of her valuables and bailed out of their unlikely alliance in the central of Arakna island. "You drive a hard bargain, Ren. Fine, for now, but you have to give me a kiss." Solia snickered with the cross of her arms as she advanced toward Ren, who turned his blushing face about. Ren and Solia shared in a locking of lips, albeit more like a peck. The pick-pocketing maiden experienced what is was like to kiss a boy, a prince at that, and a reciprocal one. Though Solia was in her twenties, she thought about ducking those who meant her harm. Ren was one fortunate blessing to receive her during the predestined hardluck-lifestyle that was set into motion after her oldest brother had rejoined Bloth's cutthroats when he was seventeen. She would give it a shot. Ren winked at Ioz, who smiled to thank Ren in his own way.

"Ahem. Ren has had a busy day, let's let him rest." Tula abruptly cut in with a curtailed scowl, rushing Ren to her joining arms. Solia smirked, smug but satisfied as she dreamily rubbed her chin. Tula let it slide, getting the twinge this peace wouldn't last forever. Ren later went into the cabin to sleep for a long while.

The sun of Mer had been sinking in the horizon as a serpentine fleet navigated the strip back to Octopon along narrow pathways of blue sea, pulling the ruby hull of the Wraith alongside. Glowing-orange beacons of fire lamps furnished the lane of ships as it cascaded through the waters partway to shore. The radiant prince was on the deck, conversing with the many who had gathered around.

"Look at this!" Ren shouted for someone to give him a visual. "This Treasure is even more powerful than the other ones we've found, it keeps the dark water away from the Wraith without having to touch it!" Ren exclaimed of magnificent discovery.

"You're right Ren!" Tula gasped in surprise at the sight of the deadly smudge wholly dissolving from the periphery of the vessel. "You know what this means, right? As long as we have the Treasure with us, we'll be safe!" The ecomancer availed as Ren nodded with confirmation. Not to mention her ecomantic skills, which could now drive the Wraith under certain circumstances.

"Just one more Treasure of Rule to find!" Ren joyfully laughed. He cinched the Compass out in front of him but something was wrong. To his puzzlement, it would only point to the Sword he toted. "What?" He temperately wondered, befuddlement taking root.

"That's very strange." Tula conspicuously observed, baffled as well. "Why isn't the Compass pointing anywhere? Did you notice it when you were looking for the Treasure?" She investigated with unfamiliarity. Niddler swooped over to see what they were chatting of.

"Ren! There aren't any minga-melons left! What are you all talking about?" The famished monkeybird shyly poked in. He fluttered up to Ren and proceeded to nudge the heir's hand.

"Actually, Tula. That's right! I don't think I even noticed it at all, I already knew where I was going so I..." Ren stumped at the telling and discomforting enlightenment.

"Ren's Compass won't light up for anything except the Sword." Tula updated the flying friend, just as foiled as Niddler. Avagon overheard the exchange and walked over, she witnessed what had been going on. She stalled to think and probed the weapon he carried, the Sword of Primus.

"Maybe the magnetic charge in the Sword is too much for the Compass?" Niddler assumed a guess.

"Strange. Ren. I think the energy in the sword may be too powerful and it is drawing the attention of the Compass, as Niddler has presumed. I have never seen anything like this before, but your father was not able to restore the sword to it's original form in his lifetime. I am not sure what to say." The elder fantastically drew a blank.

Ren thought about this. "If I can't use the Compass though, then how will I find the 13th Treasure of Rule?" Ren refuted rashly. Then, something else occurred to him. The captured map Jazhea gave to him! He delved into where he had previously stored the diagram but he could not seem to find it. "Noy jitat! It's not here!" Ren cursed from the bitter impediment. He had yielded from his search in the quarters underneath, seeing nothing recompense.

"What's not here, Ren?" Avagon adjured him, a tone of worry in the versed woman's question.

Ren realized Avagon did not know of the dark water being able to pinpoint the Treasures. "Avagon." Ren called to say to her. "Some time ago, after I found the 11th Treasure...Jazhea managed to steal a map from Bloth he was using to track me. It listed the locations of the Treasures of Rule on it. He had been working with Morpho whom we believe was gathering his information from the Dark Dweller. I know because the map was even scribbled with both of their notes. I tried to look for it, but, it must have been lost overboard..." Ren rendered in all staidness. His eyes floated downward.

Avagon's eyes widened and her head spun a jolt. "Are you serious, young one?" The ashen-lined mentor queried him, disturbed with unsettlement overt. "That is not good Ren, not good at all." She grimly forebode.

"How will I find the final Treasure if I don't know where it is. Why won't the Compass point to it? What will we do? Noy jitat!" Ren embodied his frustration, the Compass was not working well and Bloth would always promise to be back soon. After earning the 12th Treasure of Rule Ren envisioned things were looking up, now this.

"Wait, Ren." Tula started to speak, she willed to pitch a suggestion. "If what Avagon says is true about the Sword, maybe the Compass will react when it's a far distance away from it. We could take it back to the lighthouse and have Jenna hold onto it, then we could keep the 12th Treasure of Rule with us! Even if that isn't the cause then, we can try." The clever lass expressed. Ren's eyes lit up at her proposal.

"Yes, Tula. That's a great idea! That is what we will do." Ren declared with confidence, turquoise scrutiny flashed with excitement. He knew it would be dangerous being unarmed but he did not have a choice if this muddling case was true. Only one last Treasure subsisted to be found. Even if Bloth did come back, and he would, with the final Treasure he would accomplish his oath to vanquish the Dark Water for good, and for everyone.

"It will not be long until we reach the lighthouse." Avagon forewarned. "I'm afraid we will not be able to accompany you to the 13th Treasure, unfortunately. This is something you alone must do and I need to gather more citizens of Mer for the grand rise of our great city when you recover the final Treasure, Ren." Avagon smiled strongly, connoting her portending departure.

Ren was aware the prodigious armada would need to port soon. The young son could not be sure how long Avagon and her band had been awaiting him but he imagined they would be low on provisions, the dark water was treacherous as well. "I wonder how much of the dark water is out there now." Ren earnestly considered. He gazed out to sea and saw plenty of the murky black of guaranty before him. He brood of what the Dark Dweller's last words to him had been, Nine-Tenths of Mer. That assessment sat uneasy with him. His attention transiently revolved to Ioz and Zoolie who were in the midst of a friendly spat and an arm-wrestle. Something over weapons or gold, most likely. Phorlock and his squire were assessing the stars above, both sharing a bond.

"I'd say it's at least nine parts covered by now." Teron, who had been silent during most of the conversation, finally joined in with a sign. He reposed off to the side of Avagon. "The dark water will continue to reek havoc until Mer is completely devoured and the Treasures are destroyed, or, until Ren finds and collects the last one to bring to Octopon." The meek voice of the ancient ecomancer hung in the atmosphere. The sun had gone down, and it was nightfall.

It was sometime later when Ren made his arrival with the fleet in Octopon. The four greeted the matron of the lighthouse formally, though she nearly experienced a heart-attack after seeing the caravan. The brave crew left her with the Sword of Primus and to gaiety and wonder, restored even more of Ren's prominent city. The four stayed a night to rest their bodies and spirits in preparation for the next adventure. Another morning, the Wraith sailed once more. The Compass ignited and readily glinted toward the exodus from Octopon and the last and final Treasure of Rule.

~With the twelfth Treasure collected and Bloth in a mire, our heroes are in a time of rest but how long will this peace last? Will the Quest change when Tula returns from her training? Will Solia be happy living at the lighthouse? How will Ren be able to use the Thirteenth Treasure when it has been found?~

END PART TWO


	13. Commander Cutthroat

DARK WATER: Chronicles of Octopon

Chapter 12

Commander Cutthroat

Over the seas of Mer, highsun strung above mostly clear skies. Laden waters were not surrounded by land. Two ships beneath met in the indigo and stygian waves but barely wavered at all. Sounds echoed from the two hulls.

"So you've resorted to throwing people into dark water after you lost your Constrictus?! You're pathetic, Bloth!" The righteous man shattered out to the towering ship in repulsion and disgust. He heard a scream and the dark water reared up. "Stop it! Naja-dog!" Ren grit his teeth in anguish as he heard another shrill.

The blustering laugh gorged from the drab deck above. "I'll stop it, Son of Primus." The sickening disdain then finished an assertion. "Once I have the Thirteen Treasures of Rule!" The same laugh thundered another instance. "Bring me another prisoner!" The booming order roared to a troop of teeming men.

"No!" Ren anxiously yelled out. "You're nothing but a jitatan coward, dartha-eel!" The young prince had been hollering from the clipper below, the direction of his insults appeared to be a grandeur deal topmost from him, but he could hear everything that was going on.

"Five prisoners!" One voice on the deck rumbled. "10 on five!" The same called.

"15 drabals on seven!" Another cry haggled from the bow of the heightened war-vessel.

"How much is it already? Three? 40 says eight prisoners or more thrown to dark water gets the Son of Primus to the Maelstrom's deck!" Some other, more fluent challenge attested.

"800 gold pieces! Says he doesn't at all!" Likewise, the subsequent hoarse and gruff uproar sounded.

"I'll take that bet, Mantus! Yeah! Yeah!" Many shouts blazed.

"Being careless with our money again are we, Mantus?" The deranged supervisor reverberated a second time. Another wail was heard and another man dropped into the puddle of decay below.

"You twisted...cowardly! Ugh!" Ren let out a frustrated and pained howl. "Stop it, Bloth! I'll throw You into dark water, you kreld-eating darva-worm!" Ren threatened his enemy above but this only served to fuel the rage.

"Ren! Stop this madness! We have to pull out of here now!" Ioz from the wheel stammered to the blond opportunist who flew a ponytail in the blowing wind. He wondered how they had gotten themselves into this predicament, things were off to a grand start. He understood Ren's feelings toward the suffering of innocent people but Ren and Bloth had been playing verbal sea-polo for the time it would take for Niddler to clean a rind. The heat only continued to intensify and he did not like the prospect of the situation. They needed to go, and Ren was blocking the sail.

"Ioz, take us close! If we get in to range, I think we can use the Treasure to make the dark water go away! We have to stop him!" Ren flustered from the crows nest, clutching a rope in his hand.

"No, Ren! Have you gone insane? That's what he wants us to do! He'll just find more! There's nothing we can do!" Ioz seared and pounded his fist at the steering mechanism. He ceased as his ears twinged with another bleat from up high, of which caused Ren to yell out more. "Noy jitat!" He swore and crossly slammed his palm against his head.

"You don't even have your beast anymore, and by the looks of your men, I'd say you're almost finished! Come down here and I'll take you myself, you kreld-eating bloated-leviathan!" Ren shot another provoking offense overhead.

"Ren, you're making it worse! He's only doing it because we're here!" Tula uplifted an outcry from lower down, she was aware of her mate digging himself into an injurious position.

"Ren, stop it! Now! Listen to the woman, Tula! Noy jitat!" Ioz moaned with staggering words to his compromised buddy, pondering how exactly his friend planned to do said this without a weapon. He hoped Bloth had not noticed his friend didn't have a weapon.

"Boy! You think that makes any difference?! I still have my ship, my commanding officers and my crew!" Bloth tempestuously barked, indisputably edgy after Ren touched a nerve. "When I get through with you, you'll be nothing but bones, boy! And I have the dark water on my side!" He chuckled a heartless laugh from his exceeding deck. The crew bottommost could just make out the Captain's likeness and that of the dark disciple appointed next to him. "Thank the Son of Primus for your death, wench!" Bloth relished in the moment and seized a prisoner, this time a woman. Without forethought, he dumped her into the patch of dark water below and another perishing scream resulted.

"That's it, Bloth! Send your filthy crew down here, I'll take them all at once!" Ren exploded, over the edge in fury.

"That's it!" Before this situation could get any worse, Ioz groaned out as he sprinted for the mast. With some help from Niddler, he dragged the crazed prince down from aloft. "Time to go, Ren! Full sail Tula!" He racketed to the woman on deck and galloped for the steering wheel.

"No Ioz! They're innocent! We have to save them!" Ren gave hampered protest, being in a critical state.

"We can avenge all the people that dartha-eel has killed after we get the last Treasure!" Ioz lamented dutifully, focusing intensely on running the waves. "Now we have to get away, and it's going to be difficult! Wind is going South, not on course but we'll have to take it." He analyzed acutely as he plowed the cutwater through in a hard rightturn, wholly along the encasing impasse. All blockade from the deathtrap opened up as Tula enchanted the rudder to move with the flow.

"Go after them!" Bloth blasted from the platform of the cruiser as the Wraith swiftly dodged way in dark water, it yielded no boundary due to the immensely powerful 12th Treasure of Rule that dissipated the substance whenever the small ship went into it. The Maelstrom would have to follow very gingerly in the tracks of the schooner, and with Morpho's help. The plague of Mer had been so bad the seas were just-near impossible to sail.

"We'll find out their plan easily after we offer them our help. Ren is bound to tell us how to use the River of Toishuok." The cohort directly behind the Captain stroked feathers of a mule bird as he whispered an intent. Under his counter arm he loaded a pistol. Having climbed his holding shoulder, the memorat shrieked.

If this is Tula's doing, then she has the makings of a supreme ecomancer. "Impressive..." On one word the Captain of the Maelstrom was satisfactorily transfixed in surveying the Wraith through the rolling ocean. Not only did she summon the blue waves, but everything that drove from fore to aft was plainly under such an adept trigger of natural talent. "Indeed, I want everything on the Wraith, including that mirrorwork of Su-" Bloth was frazzled from his daydream by the snores harrowing from across the platform. Konk babbled to uncertain destination, curling over to resume a nap. "Even when there's no feasible way to bother me more, you somehow find one! Prepare the drip-gear!" He ceased twiddling the snares of his beard to slap the lieutenant with a splashing wake-up call.

"Yes, Lord Bloth!" Konk sat up with a salute and a distinguishing growl, wiping away water from the bucket that was thrown on him.

"How much longer?" Bloth swayed about, directing the units.

"We're go, Bloth." Caws from a frightful memorrat glided to safety as the consultant lifted a darva-worm between two scant fingers, successfully transposing the signal. The dart in hand shot into the tormented larva that fell to the floor under a knife's gash. The erroding flesh of the lifeform entirely replaced with a clear film as it twisted and contorted until Mantus stomped out the screeches with a misery-ending toe.

"Challenge me, boy? Let's see how you like a taste of real pain!" Ren dove a frontal lunge to escape the reaching beasts of air at Bloth's dictate. Talons embedded on Ren and Ioz's shoudlers, loosing them on the drizzled floor. Ioz and he both were relocated to the plundering empire.

"Now we're done for!" Ioz busted from a sparse junction where Mantus and packs of wreckers prowled forth swinging chains and bearing one particularly slipshod revolver.

"We have one chance!" Ren unleashed the call as he uncorked the potion. "Not so fast!" Viridian smoke consumed the waft and ringed the royal-one as it spilled from a concoction given by Apsin, one of his father's Seven Captains Ioz and Tula had bunted into on the Maelstrom. Supposedly, the flask was forged with a penchant for stunning all evil men with a good conscience. He concealed his nassalway as the vapor spread.

"What is this?" The only Maelstrom pirate uneffected by Apsin's conscience-elixer tumbled his bone-white head in stun. Bloth lumbered with a cutlass bent to contain the sailor mates on the starboard. He choked on the oodles of his legion, who were either ruing their sons or mourning their wives and daughters. Some sea-man cried out for his auntie in shame as another carved on the planking all the terrible deeds he had done.

"Quick! Jump overboard, now!" Ioz excited Ren as he backed up in excess on the broad boards to run from the loathesome nightmare of Bloth. Ren bound over the Mantus bawling in a fetal position for all those ransacked.

Ren and Ioz easily cambered to the shaky bridge with the help of improv parachutes from the Maelstrom's sail-hide. The Wraith quickly winged in the opposite path of the ensuing Treasure, it had hardly launched out. The shock ran through the sleek deck as the large ship bumped fringes with the concise one as it tried to yaw, almost threatening to overturn the craft in question.

"Chungo lungo!" Ioz clamored from the gears, harassed and nigh to slipping hands off the spindles as the boat backlashed and rocked.

"Not again!" Niddler balefully stressed, sliding across the planks with a screech.

The Wraith tipped and hemmed as Ioz wrangled to drive through the yanking undertow. "Prepare to be starfished!" The confusion arose from a frame debarking from a jelly-chute. Reotozz planted to the deck, following multiple starfishuriken that pelted into the water. "Tremble with terror, Son of Primus, your archnemesis Ensign Reotozz is here to make you well-starred!" The Securitat bandit gladdened and begun to scale the mast. Starfishuriken splattered the wood below.

"Who said you were my archnemesis? I've never seen you before you started chasing me." Ren evaluated the presumptuous foe.

"Get him off the ship!" Ioz yelled stormily from hurrying to climb after the maniac enthusiast, Tula covering around the bend as much as able.

"Prepare for me, Ren, for I will bring you to my employer Mizzen-Conquest! This time Reotozz has a surprise in store! I'll shove a Starfishruken up your stern! Ahahahahaaaaa!" More starfishuriken clumped out from above, gluing to the cabin and into the sea. Not a single one landed on anything of consequence.

"Oh shut up!" Niddler squawked gallingly after skimming the air, he dove for the intruder with purport to rid the mainsail of the bother. Ioz reached the peak as more sticky asterozoa harmlessly stuck to the canvas.

"You're more aggravating than Konk. Bloth must be low on wharf-rats from the sea-slum, I wouldn't let you muck the dagron cages and I'd rather be thrown to a Constrictus than have to listen to you any more-Scoot!" Ioz snorted with a miffed involvement. He batted his blade's flat side at the raving headache, which Reotozz pawed away from. "Why, Mantus, why this dagron-feeding-frenzy of a sensory sabotage?" He griped as he swatted at the rambunctious annoyance. The hull continued to teeter to and fro. "Niddler, the helm!" He notified swiftly.

"Then, I'll shove your keel into an entire port of starfish kreld-paste!" Reotozz screamed and pointed a blast gun at Ioz, but it wouldn't fire. He inspected the barrel and shot himself in the face with a trio of bameme, which arranged him to fall off the spire. Four more barrages released on the descent downward but instead of tackling their targets, the bitters like spiders simply puffed out their expanding abdomens and floated away into the distance.

"I'll shove you, dock-rat!" Tula skipped down next and with a grit poise, hit away Reotozz with the wince into the narrow ring of blue sea.

"No one cares about Reotozz! This won't be the last you see of me!" Reotozz bawled as he zipped away on a hookline back to the Maelstrom.

"Kuunda help us!" Ioz unhappily riled. The defending league absorbed themselves in any possibility of escape. Ren was distracted with fixing the menial damage.

Before the Wraith righted itself, a shadow of a capacious beast loomed over the deck. The dagron dipped down with intent to catch the youngest member of the crew, instead it made contact with the veteran sailor.

"Put me down, dartha-eel!" The angry Ioz routed out. He clawed at the scaly leg that gripped his shoulder. The lizard zoomed over pools of the deadly black over the line of sea.

"You're not Ren!" The abrasive dagron-rider growled as he now observed he had apprehended the wrong guy. The dagron unlatched it's talons, attempting to drop the man into the rotting ooze underneath but Ioz retained to the dagron's nail with one arm. "Let go!" He irately snarled out, being unable to trash the parasite.

"And miss the opportunity to beat you senseless, kreld-eater?" Ioz tormented the driver, climbing up the dagron's leg to find a seat on the back of the beast with the pilot. The aviator turned a scowl, a smutty black mane flapped away with the head. The dagron ringed wildly over the streams of blistering glop.

"What's going on?" Tula cried out from the ruddy ship below, merely grazing a glance at the silhouette of the monster that carried her shipmate. Ren stood at the wheel, goggling in awe.

"Regrettably, you'll meet your brutal end, Ioz! You've caused enough problems for myself and Captain Bloth, now die! The dark water will bury you!" Mantus seethed and lashed around to face the attacker. The dagron swept in a wide swerve in effort to shake the enemy away.

"As if brutality is a problem for you, you depraved sea-weasel!" Ioz hatefully reviled, snide and hostile as he crawled his way up to where the frail master of the blade had placed himself.

Mantus sneered and stepped up on the back of the lizard to kick Ioz off and into the lurid doom beneath them, scraping out a leg. His aim had been poor however, and Ioz enabled a clamp around the henchman's ankle. Mantus grit his toothless mouth in despise, managing to hang on to the nape of the dagron with his rangy hands.

"Ioz, no!" Tula shrieked from the Wraith, watching the flurry taking place before her eyes. The dagron twisted and tracked between the Wraith and the Maelstrom, right over the endless sea of disaster.

"Lose him, Mantus! He doesn't have the Treasure! He's of no use to us!" Bloth's loud reproach crashed from across the strip dividing the dual ships, where the dark water flowed abundant.

"If he'd let go!" Mantus gnarled out in response, loathesome to the leg-leech. "Natchut!" He bitterly hissed and knocked his foot out to try to flay the invader off of him and into the perils of the deep.

"Scot pango! We have to try to get close or he's going to fall in!" Ren furiously commanded, his eyes expanding with terror. "That wicked kreld-eater..." He grimly rumbled.

"They're making me very worried! I can't do anything, there's no real water for me to ecomance, and I can't make us go far enough!" Tula hollered severely, panicking with passion in her emphasis. "Niddler!" Tula cried out to the frazzled monkeybird on deck. "You have to do something!" She screamed as the monkeybird obliged, nodding his feathered head.

"That stinking-wretch, Ioz, is too hot-headed to accept his end! Send reinforcements!" Bloth's infuriated voice thundered out the order. Dagrons began filling the air. Niddler had not yet reached his target before the strife broke out.

"Pull me up you hast-masted imbecile!" Ioz desperately shouted, occupying enlarged eyes of jet, qualms and fears of dark water filtering into his head.

"How about I kick you down instead!" Mantus's scathing speech gruffly slugged. He slammed a thrusting kick with his adjacent leg at the ebony-toned navigator dangling from his cuff. The dagron savagely veered, madly thrashing. It snarled, not enjoying being used as a fighting-den. It prolonged in the wrangle to project the two pirates away.

"You're as stupid as you are insane, Mantus, fighting on a dagron over dark water...is murder-suicide!" Ioz painfully and heatedly struggled out. He endured the pounding tread of the violent man, who also began to lose his anchor on the beast. The scrawny enemy did not look like much to deal with, but the boot felt like a hammering avalanche as it smashed against Ioz's head. He did not wish to accept the fact he had started to lose his grasp on the ankle, he would not fall to a smothering grave below.

"You're as dead as you are defiant! Natchut!" The commander's flouts began to lace with dread, his fingertips curdled while bearing the weight of both men afloat but he frantically belted his heavy heel at the offender's face. He saw the hope of the dagrons from his master in the distance flying forward with nets.

"Ay jitata! Ioz, hang on!" Tula wailed out, upset and intense. Niddler flew the way, but he had not yet made it.

"Noy jitat! They won't stop swerving in the air! Have to pull closer..." Ren forced out through burdened breath. He concentrated on steering the Wraith under the flustered dagron.

"Hurry up, you dingamords!" Bloth bellowed out at the dagron pilots from the Maelstrom. Dark water began to creep up the side of the leviathan-bone carcass. "Morpho!" He furiously barked at the disciple. Morpho's hissed snarl became eminent.

"How is life running the Bluelips Death-Squad? Been treating you well, tyrant? Having fun doing Bloth's dirtywork? How about Strand? Having a good time with your buddy, old friend? I think you should feel what it's like on the other end!" Ioz fatally roared. He aspired to pull Mantus down, swinging his brawn from side-to-side. The dagron spun on axis as it gnashed, steamed and sore.

"If you pull me down, worm, you'll die, yourself!" Mantus grizzled out, scorning with a hateful stare. He bashed his foot like a battering ram at the clinging seadog's head. He grappled for his handle on the dagron's nape, his hands had started to slip. He searched his eyes to the approaching flock of reptiles, still in a fathomable distance.

"That would be fine with me, wilted kreld-eater. But that won't be happening!" Ioz haughtily proclaimed as he shifted his eyes to the advancing monkeybird of a red color. He grinned smugly.

"You asinine dimwit!" Mantus howled and fought to free his entrapped leg, he succeeded in kicking himself free. Ioz let go and fell. He had nearly reached the ingesting sleaze but Niddler nabbed him in time as a black tendril whipped out. Mantus became capable of slightly hauling himself up by the arms. "This won't be the last you see of me!" The evil second-in-command coarsely yelled back as the dagron made it's way back to home on the Maelstrom, and the swarm soon followed.

"Morpho, do something about this!" Bloth supplicated from his monstrosity. The Maelstrom was venturing to cycle around in direction of the vamoosing chase but by some event of fortune or due to someone's carelessness with the obsidian water, the titan ship had become stuck and this gave the Wraith a headstart. Ioz continued to steer onward upon landing on the vessel.

"Bigger isn't always better, eh, Bloth?" Ren taunted with a hand-to-cheek gesture at the freighter behind them. I'll get you yet, boy! He imagined he heard Bloth reply.

"You think that's the last of them?" Niddler asked a hopeful question.

"Not on your life, monkeybird." The rough swashbuckler at the controls of the buoyant craft expressed. Niddler seemed disappointed.

"Bloth is really angry." Tula morbidly indicated, staring through a telescope at the scene from the rear. The wind had changed direction now and Ioz designed Northbound toward the focus. "Ay jitata! I don't think this is the end! Noy jitat, what is that troublemaker up to now?" Tula rung of alarm as she observed something peculiar in her eyeglass.

"What, Tula? What do you see?" Ioz fastidiously prodded for a response.

In short breadth from the Wraith, a miniature army of dagron-riders encircled the sky over the Maelstrom. The duo of the ships verged on a cloaking hutch of stone protruding above the floor of the ocean. The schooner and the freighter passed the concealing mountain by.

"After ages of following this long course, we've found them! Now, to make them smile!" The charmingly guileful rider sung as the dagron swooped around with many in tail. Maps and charts unfolded from the coordinated crew, tracing a copied destination through the clouds. Tiny round-objects had been thrown off bestial backs. They rolled, flopping into the rocky gorge of the massive shelf. Steam gushed and hissed, then the wind came alive with a constant buzz.

The crew of the minuscule ship jut abound in activity. The Wraith prepared to flee like a denoba water-snake.

"Jenna said she'd look after her!" Ren verbalized, in a daze as he procured a gawk at the blowout of people revolving on the reptilian transports. He aided Tula in tugging on a line for skating away from the predicted catastrophe.

"She probably didn't know about this." Tula deduced ordinarily, increasing the sail to adequacy.

"She's going to get us killed!" Ioz blustered out, he swung the wheel away from the curve the giant wasps were creating in the sky.

Across from the humble vessel, chaos had ignited and deteriorated. The ominous hum shredded through audible boundaries, whopping beasts whirled without rest.

"Fire the catapults! Take those rogue dagrons out of the sky!" The Pirate Lord tossed demands at his minions. "Ack!" He galled as he slit a sharp rim into one of the oversized insects that were in pursuit of carnage. Artillery ripped flaming rubble at the unwanted company, taking out a few of the swarm as the remaining pests divebombed.

"Bloth, we have to try to block the nest! We can't battle the Wraith with these wasps!" Mantus's hollowing screech followed with drastic transmission. The lithe contriver plunged to the floor with a howl, protecting his head and face from the rampage. The buzzing sounded like a plague.

"Whoaaa!" Konk critically moaned, being boosted up into the air by a mooching bug until his boss cleaved way to his plop on the board. Many ransackers in back of him maddened.

"Very well, move the scout-ships!" The Captain deferred an order. "By the abyss! What?!" Rebuking, he distinguished squishing sounds of mollusks hitting his deck. He flew into a foiled ire when one kissed his face.

"Hope you like Septopus eggs for breakfast!" The chiding female yowled cheerily from overhead. Dagron pilots swooped about, dropping slimy eggs out of burlap sacks. The Maelstrom blew in to plug the outpour over the solid hive but could not curb the bleed of the double invasion.

Farther away, the scourge spread throughout the vicinity.

"What under the two moons is going on?!" Tula hollered in thwarted enthusiasm as she swatted away at a rather exorbitant stinger.

"They're attacking the Maelstrom!" Ren trumpeted from tapping on foot and nimbly evading the claws of two greedy exoskeletons.

"Ren, in case you haven't noticed they're attacking us too! Scot pango at these Kuunda-cursed vermin!" Ioz disdained as he scored a wasp obstructing his eyesight, then smacked it with the metal.

"This is what she meant by making it up to me?" Ren brooded at the concept of this misplaced endearment. He watched the Maelstrom in the wide space push in front of the entryway to the fissure, not even the rival ship seemed to be plenteous enough to cap all the cracks. Many underlying dinghies of the malevolent fortress aligned to produce an insufficient seal over the crease of the den.

"Ren!" Ren adjusted his study to the alien tone accosting him from afar, he saw Bloth at the margin of the ridged crust. "Secure the exit!" The heavyset warlord rallied. The prince ducked as another wasp slashed at him and then hissed into the sail of the crimson floater, perforating a diminutive hole. He then viewed the master across the barrier throwing a meager fit and Mantus swerving away from the right-hand side to rapt out direction to all of Bloth's troops. More Septopi spilled on the Leviathan giant, scaling up every suitable fixture.

"Will we ever get away from them?" Ioz tiredly remarked and slogged a palm against his scalp.

"We have to listen to him, unfortunately. Ren, help me patch that tear." Tula sighed gruelingly and readied the sail to move in.

"Chungo lungo. For once he's right." Ioz toilsomely relented and cranked to herd the vehicle beside the skeletal barge, arranging it congruent. Incessant thumping could be heard on the hull of the Wraith as the terrors rabidly pelted the obstacle of escape. The insidious buzzing ravaged any calm ambiance.

"Launch the catapults! Take out the rest of this aggravating nuisance!" The gargantuan overlord dictated. "Noy jitat!" He profaned and raged uncouthly, tearing an amorous septopus from his inflated paunch.

"Now, you driveling blockheads!" Mantus snapped at the subordinates, instructing the organized pirates on the platform of the ruthless sea-warrior. The lackey bandits crushed back the sling in formation to besiege the excess of the freed stingers. More embryonic and gooey wads plunked on the terrace from riders above, immediately dispatching.

"Avast ye! Prince Ren! I will bring you traumatizing nightmares of Starfish! For the rest of your excruciatingly-tragic life your every impression of the cloud's shapes, your every reflection in the water's edge will only resemble the face of Ensign Reotozz! Ahaahahaahahahaaaaaa!" From the spikes of the Maelstrom, Reotozz cackled as he bombed his bazooka into the breeze. The incapable starfishuriken were about to flop harmlessly into the ocean below before being snatched by a white dagron's jaws.

"Reotozz, you missed!" Jazhea tigerishly scoffed. She pointed to the form of Mantus, who was leading the launching sequence. "Who the raffendi made you ensign?" She huffed, zinging away on the diverse familiar.

"This is what I call an entertaining meal!" Niddler beak-smacked, crunching on a bite to eat and watching the fireworks.

"They're still out there, Niddler." Ioz benevolently reminded the all-too-eager monkeybird.

"That doesn't mean I can't enjoy the moment." Niddler argued a difference in perspective and then veered up for only a blink. The deficient time would be all that was needed to observe the Maelstrom single-handedly decimating the entirety of the hummers from the air. The dagrons prevailed to elude.

"You robbed me of everything I owned and tossed me aside to die! Well I survived!" Overhead, a random woman's voice split.

"You killed my brother and my sister and ruined our town!" The noise of a younger fellow outcried within the cluster.

"Attack Bloth and Mantus! For the sake of Octopon! And for Kayraadin!" Jazhea lambasted a warcry at the foes, a brigade of friendly dagrons stagnated abaft. To the right of her hovered an unrelated lady on a lizard, awaiting the instant to strike.

The wicked pirate-boss scoured at the platoon above. "Kill them! Teach her a lesson!" The rotten pillager boomed to his legions of viciousness. Looters mounted adverse dagrons at the bone-screened pit for assault. The commander flit on adept toes to the stable after shooting a perturbing glance, counseling patrol of the aerial squadron.

"Come out and play, Mantus! I'll be rather disappointed if you don't engage me." Jazhea called from the air, the massive beast teased the second-rank by bumping him off the heel and on to the ratty planking. "You're not getting me this time, now I have reinforcements! I brought you some friends from Valjen!" The golden-plaited girl baited, then zooming in a beeline to the zenith. The glint from an aqua embellishment dotted her path.

"What?!" Mantus floundered out with a dumbfounded casting, he scampered to his feet and set his beady blues on the peculiar characteristics of the enemy faction.

"Quin hide! Let's sink our blades into it!" One excited persecutor goaded from the airway.

"The Quin, I thought those kreld-bloods died out." The second contemptuous bully ridiculed.

"You're going to die out!" The enraged officer condemned and then agilely climbed up the back of one of the reptiles, sharply bludgeoning into the clouds.

"I can't see what's going on!" Tula echoed out from below, witnessing with an eyepiece the airborne parade that pierced the skyline. Green monsters from both camps clashed in a show of ferocity. "Ay jitata!" She shrieked as a flying buccaneer torpedoed over the brink, the Wraith spiraled in a tailspin and jerked back into the wall that sheltered the colony. From the temporary lapse, a lone wasp squeezed out.

"Chungo lungo!" Ren harshly let out, skidding on a slippery panel. "I think Jazhea is in trouble, again." He sighed as he unlocked the clam-launcher to spin the shell volley which pinged Mantus off his concentration, granting the princess narrow escape.

"Ioz! Help!" Niddler squalled as he careened on shaky feathers to evade the stray bee.

"Careful, monkeybird!" Ioz rushed out and shimmied up the net to slap the assailant into the water. Niddler fluttered to a home post.

"Don't come near us grotto-grub, this is our ship-now find another! I'm done with you and your darva-scud!" Tula screamed as she tore her cutlass, distinguishing a vague and ambiguous pirate in the sky that soared next to Bloth's commander.

"You used to crew for that kreld-eater?!" Ioz spat, so floored that he almost tripped over fully.

"It's a long story!" The ecomancer hastily shouted over her blunder. She pointed emerald discs of bewitched epiphany at the now mostly-synthetic surrogate.

"What, wench?! You look familiar! You weren't that pinky baby I stole by mistake, were you?! What?!" The artificial rogue caromed from the high gale before braying and necessitating to skirt away from the devious swordsmaster on dagron-back.

"Attack!" Mantus hatefully charged out to the other pirates piloting dagrons. He set his sight on one enemy in eyeline, a unipedal and bronze-complexioned outlaw who appeared to be swinging for the sunset-tinged vehicle. "By Kuunda's blessing! I don't need to wait until I'm not on duty to destroy you, Valjen bilge-bucket!" He retched out at the competitor, who knocked a misshapen head in reverse to view the danger.

"Finally!" Konk brashly expelled. "You! You is free game now! Me lose leg to Constrictus because of You! And chance at thousand gold!" The corpulent pegleg spat to the side and advanced forward, seated on the spine of the beast. "You and your fake Treasure! You not make fool of Konk so easily!" The loathsome runt postured and drove in close to join Mantus and the other party. He unsheathed a fierce hatchet, issuing it a polluted lip for good luck.

"Konk, you advance from the rear and cut him off. I'm going to sever his head." The angular shape of the second-in-command menacingly butchered a blade from a holster, his rigid words meant for the man of the conversation. The intruder squealed and bolted in the wind, Mantus and Konk tore aerial curves in heated pursuit. "Valjen slug! Die!" Mantus intercepted the unipod's exit path and forbid any attempt to strike, the piglet tumbled behind.

"Look, it's Tulka Mantus! Yoho, how is it going, stick? Almost didn't recognize you with those wrinkles! Ahahahaa! Being the first Beard-Looper to grow your strands won't save your headstrong Guuda-skin from the Valjen blade! Aaaahahahahaa!" When the Quin bladesman anticipated to incise the prey of his wrath, he sighted more of the Valjen raiders as they whisked by and derided. The pack drew imminent as arms and other limbs flicked out, desiring to flip the commander from his seat. Mantus groaned in distress, trying to slash at the adversaries.

"Hey guuda-blood!" One of the nasty instigators teased.

"Say that again and I'll cut you to pieces!" Mantus roared out from in front of the tormentor.

"Alright. I'm sorry, Tulka Mantus. Tukla of the Guuda-bloods!" The rascal harried with an entertained guffaw.

The artful swordsman unleashed a warcry in oppressed savagery, he took out the inane deformity on the opposing mount. He glided away from the encroaching hecklers but almost crashed when he recognized the person barring his line.

"Traitorous deserter! Any amount of restoration would have helped. I really should kill you, you know, because you are dead to me." Reproved a woman who shadowed her eyes under an unusual cloak. The periwinkle regalia was strapped overtop her dress, she was perched on a fellow beast. She sailed in an unrestrained hunt of the weedy pilot. Jazhea flew at her side and in close formation.

"But you won't, Saytai." Mantus hardheartedly castigated, his dagron slanted in a close waft over the Maelstrom. The masked woman slid through the sky side-saddle on the pale dagron like a sea-witch on a broomstick, a white slip flapped above her ankles in the wind.

"That doesn't mean I wouldn't like to!" Saytai immediately gritted an acrid response as she confronted the object of her onslaught, tightly bracing the bridle. Tearing down her hood, she revealed an embellished scalp. Slate-encumbered locks in the mold of a bobbed topknot divulged of a character well-groomed in age for her race.

"Smool-brained female! There was nothing left, especially after Phorlock betrayed us as well!" The wicked duelist declared with a pointed arm at the argumentative lass, scurrilous and shredding in mannerism.

"It's that witch! This is madness!" Ioz stared with vagueness at the contentious outsider that was ripping bones against Mantus, days long gone blazing into his memory instantaneously.

"You mean that is Phorlock's squire!" Tula corrected him, identifying the figure. Ren stared with puzzlement, it couldn't be Quorzor, or could it? He then observed more company, as it had undoubtedly decided to drop by.

"Die, you worm!" Reotozz soared at peak of the sky. Screaming with a dramatic fever, he bombarded the red floor crazily as he catapulted over the dagron's back and swirled around the loading hatch. He pivoted up to his boots to lug back the latch of the starzooka, but before his completion more Maelstrom goons riding scaly lizards bumped him into saltwater. The securitat ensign sorely rambled. In the midst of the battle between the wasps and two legions of reptiles, Tula watched their Maelstrom enemies taking down climbing outlaws on the Wraith as they both battled for gold. The Captain's men were actually taking care in disposing of the Quest's interrupters, who were unbeatable on their own.

"He never told you, did he? You abused his respect for you and his trust, now you won't know the full story. He would have wanted you to stay regardless of what happened, not chase after your grudge with the outsiders for twenty years. You have no right to forfeit responsibility, not after that fallacy you told everyone. His words weren't meant to be used that way. He never would have prohibited me, especially with conditions the way they were. You knew that!" The lady with hair of clean obsidian constrained from drawling into an impassioned burn to Mantus. She drifted away from the horde of the sieging steeds and chased the comparably-gaunt profile amid the sky.

"You mean that truth you told. Fool shuskav! You were always out for me, trying to take my place! It was never your place, you should have been glossing over your courters! Unfortunately for you, I'm the best swordsman on Mer now!" The unscrupulous combatant aggrandized with a flash of a rather sharp edge. He trimmed the steel at the pervading nuisance but he skewed the air far from where the point designed to hit.

"I know where your place is, dirty darva-worm!" The shrilling dame bustled into focus and with no delay, Jazhea pushed the thief off the competing dagron. With a snarl, Mantus sorely hit his rump on the floor of the brawling Maelstrom.

"I'm sure. Too bad it's not twenty years ago. But here's your chance. Do it. Best Swordsman on Mer. You know you'll lose if you kill me." Saytai's dagron dipped within an arm's length as she boldly challenged the commander, her thin hands spread submissively at her sides.

Mantus bolted at the stalky woman, ready to sliver with a blade. Instead of making contact, the curved weapon clumsily digressed to the side. "Arrrgh!" The lethal duelist screamed, throwing a fit of rage.

"Excuse me for my bad manners." Saytai hastily remounted her transport as two brutes on the scaffold trounced at her with slicers. Apologetic, she politely wriggled from their clang. "By Nahrook, the Sixth ally spoken betrays you. You haven't yet held your last key." To Mantus she charred with spoken thorns.

"I know how much you love being robbed, my friendly crook!" Jazhea raved as she plowed down on the contiguous dagron and forced Mantus on his back once more. She mugged from him the gold he carried and a scrolled parchment, she lifted to the mist yet again as the same pair collided to plunge at her.

"Glossing over courters. Instead of trying to actually do something good, ky Mantus? Hah, and you condemn me for letting our home fall to ruin? Corrupt niok. You would have wanted Qui-Qua to burn to ashes before you'd ever want me to ascend. Kuunda forbid." Saytai berated abruptly, rushing down from the air and hovering abrupt over the second-in-command who, tepidly bent up from the floor. "You just can't take the hit to your own narcissism, but, do you know what? Titles are meaningless. You'll hurt people who don't deserve it, Mantus, yet you won't hurt the one you hate the most. Your own tahk susika, your worst enemy of all." The sapient pilot rebuked, hailing a spindly quartet of fingers at the glowering militant below. "Farewell, ky pup." Issuing her final and biting exit, she united with the partnering lizard. "Thanks for the help, Jazhea. Though, I must admit, I never thought such a prowess could come from someone so young. You're only half my age, it took me almost twice as long to reach your level, even with yahil's help." Saytai graciously praised the collaborator with the head of gold, her own midnight tresses thrashed in the blowing surge behind her.

"Don't mention it. I owe you for being my vision." Jazhea warbled with a clever smirk. She peered at Mantus climbing the heights with his reptile on which he had regained support. His wicked beam met her fragile eyes and promised.

"No problem for a friend of yahil's. Unfortunately this isn't the last time you need to worry, after the sky reaches a peak of darkness you will be visited. Fortunately, it may be by a benevolent millionaire. Unfortunately, you may be trapped into enslavement and misery until your death, if you are unable to free yourself one last time. So says the constellation of Nahrook. That is free of charge for you." Saytai generously advised.

"I understand how it is to be an underdog of your refinement, but I can't say I would be a professional diviner out of pure boredom. Do you always wear that flower in your whorl?" Jazhea pointed to the dusty pentagon covering the jeweled comb that held her accomplice's topknot. She gawked around her back, feeling ill-at-ease.

"Oh, this old thing? This is my way. From our nation it's hard to declare your adulthood when you can't grow beard quills." In reaction Saytai stretched a fingertip to the adorned hair to unlatch the soft petals. "The Saqtie-Star of Qui-Qua, the very thing yahil named me for. Though I think he could have done better a job, who wants to be named after something that puts people to sleep? Especially, when their only use is anaesthetic, Phorlock and Mantus are both names of Admirals. The blossoms are pretty and that is it. You can have it if you want. This one won't, it's lost it's dust." She offered the shimmering blossom to the close lass.

"You keep it. I'm just thankful you're helping us out." Jazhea gratefully admired the courageous spirit of her component, but this time she remembered her arms tied to the deck and being crunched under their boots while Mantus accomplished his work on her for not crawling before his orders. She feared he would do this again, like he had before.

"I would be lying if I said working with this naja-dirt doesn't make my stomach ill, even if we are at peace now." Saytai said of and cringed at the repugnant allies of the South Pole she felt animosity for, their mere presence on the white dagrons irked and made her queasy. She then hurtled in the direction of the Wraith, continuing alongside the younger woman and fronting the mercenary syndicate.

"Whooaaa!" Konk bellowed after forcibly disembarking from a common dagron and crashing where his captain watched the aerial warfare through a spyglass. He picked himself up from the flopped-down position of his pudgy belly with a groan. "Bloth, what going on?" Konk waddled to his boss in wonder, watching the dancing beasts.

"Looks like my Capture is playing with some old friends of his. At least they're leaving, that means we can go back to taking that Treasure from Ren." Bloth tore the magnifying tube away from his perspective, he relieved an amused laugh.

"Capture, Sir?" The pegleg puzzled quizzically. He saw the Pirate Lord only roll an eye at him and grunt.

"Mantus, prepare to attack!" The obese antagonist rioted, Konk shrugged indifferently and turned tail to hobble off.

"They're clearing out, we need to move! Tula and Niddler, that sail better be ready!" Ioz shouted out from racing to the helm. Tula sprinted about, preparing the Wraith to abscond.

"We'll need to hit favorable wind, otherwise those wasps will come back!" Tula forewarned from remodeling the riggings. Niddler clamped on a halyard and strung it, drifting on agitating wings. The hive gradually stirred at castoff.

"Wait!" Ren pointed out a shadow looming overhead.

"There you go! It's yours even though you don't need it any more! Bye brother!" Jazhea cheerfully whooshed by with an adios, ascending up into the heights. "You can have this too!" Her afterthought flourished in succession and Ren listened to the the clunk of two articles hitting the timber pier. The first appeared to be a scroll of some sort, and a subsequent bag of gold. The blond rider vanished into the area from whence she came.

"Chippango!" Ioz alerted with awe at the monetary addition, black eyes scanned the skyline.

"Hello, Ren." The precedent voice greeted the prince. Harmonizing with the ship was an elegant adult of middleyears and steam-blue regalia, she was withdrawing into the ocean. From above she spotted Ren reading the map. "It's Takot na Ronka, Loorkuz na Octopon. Chronicles of Octopon. Sorry, sometimes Merrian Common still flips me. You'll read the whole message someday! I would for you but-" She hinted and then needed to speedily revolve, fleeing from insects and dagrons of Bloth.

"Wait, who are you?" Ren returned extraordinarily, he let the map of Arakna Island and of The River of Rule that was formerly in his possession slack in his arm.

"I'm a diplomat, you could say." The hovering and diminishing sound answered. "Well, a kin at least! Mak Toi, ky one!" The explanation of the mysterious gentlewoman faded as fast as her lean shape, the jet-haired pilot coursed en route of the Octopian princess. The surviving of the beneficent dagrons assumed the same path.

"They bought us some time." Ioz durably stated, the Wraith flew for outside waters while the Maelstrom labored to organize her own chaos.

"I could have done more to stop him!" Ren sedately cursed, still stewing about the prior incident.

"Ren, there was nothing you could have done." Ioz bolstered soundly from a stance at the wheel. "You know you were getting too wishful." Ioz talked of his own previous and necessary action.

"You're right. I just hate to see innocent people suffer." Ren grieved with bitterness, an undertone spiked his mental vision.

"So do we!" Tula confirmed in a steadfast hail. "Ren, I wonder why there are eight names your father wrote instead of the Seven Captains we need to find. Apsin's knowledge, on the Maelstrom he told us to beware the Captain who ran, and betrayed us to the strongest side. I wonder who. Teron. Mizar. Phorlock. Iskjar. Sheelia. Kauldron. Apsin and Sugii...so who?" She burdensomely tried to fathom, as she examined the etching on the back of the picture frame. The prince sighed and shrugged. In good balance, she slid the photo back to Ren. "Guyfoo isn't able to stand up! Ioz, you didn't fix the nestbox so he wouldn't have to support himself on his haunches, and he's hungry!" Tula criticized her pirate friend as she caught a glimpse of the bovine dinosaur, collapsed under the weight of the capsule and unable to stand. She labored with the halyard in arms.

"Why don't you use your sea-ballet to tiptoe over here and Gracefully fix it, Your Majesty?" Ioz snidely taunted at the avoidance of his job, out of jealousy he scoffed about his lack of use to the team.

"I will, if you let me!" Tula ground her teeth at the overloaded chores she needed to engage in. She finished tying down the line and crossed her arms, sticking her neck out at the contrary misfit. She used the mediocre links of energy that remained in her to reassemble the thriving stilts of Guyfoo's pen.

"Is there anything, you can't do, woman?" Ioz grouched as he watched. He would have credited the ecomancer for her skill, but he was not feeling like so much of a man.

"Yes, there is, stop you from being a kreld-swallowing smool-pig!" The nature-femme sourly gave one more groan before she knelt away in full to care for the creature.

"You know, Ren. Maybe we should just let her do everything. It Is Wonderful!" Ioz awkwardly swayed the controls, mockingly quoting Avagon's words.

"Stop blaming me for everything that happens, do you think I asked for all this?! Why you...meat-headed water-slu-" Tula had been dangerously close to loosing her even character with every insult Ioz persisted on pushing on her. Instead, the sulky bandit simply reined in his temper. The other two co-mates did not seem effected in the least by the quarrel as they composed course, Ren and Niddler were everything but whistling while they worked. They played their games while searching the scope of their route.

"I have a sense...Guyfoo will give us something we need for our Quest! It has to be..." Tula tended to the animal, finding a sensation as she stroked the rotund capsule inside the toothy mouth.

"Good. Now tell me where the nearest port is, so we can sell it for what we need." Ioz stirred his eyes over at the charmer and the crossbreed, he fancied a greedy lust. Tula expressed a severe disgust and scuffed away from his attention. Ioz reached into his pocket to withdraw a portion of prawn meat he had saved from earlier. "Don't tell the woman I did that." He whispered to the guardian dinosaur as he disposed of the tidbit through a toss. Guyfoo grinned.

"I wonder...who the child is. If Quorzor is part of Z.M.Q, then why she was helping us as the squire for one of my father's Seven Captains? Phorlock is trustworthy." Ren began to dwell on what the Dark Dweller had spoken of in the realm of the dark water.

"The Child of the River from Northern Blue, right, Ren?" The monkeybird pondered about the cryptic phrasing of the evil existence. "Guyfoo-capsule, so heavy." Niddler trilled and sweat as he shuffled up to his spectator, helping to drag the capsule's berth near to the crew-partner. Ren was not the only one thinking on how to solve the Z.M.Q. mystery and the underground trades with Bloth.

"We sure are meeting a variety of people, Niddler, but I'm sure as Septopon Jazhea promised she would stop attacking Bloth. I suppose she's helping us. This is the same map from before." The venturesome royal serenely noted as he perused the foreign print. "If it showed us anything but Arakna, we might have an idea of where we're going." Ren conducted with an eye for any similar landmarks. Anomalous haze begun to pour over, staining the sky with a disparity of warm blue and nullifying hollowness.

"She did fetch us plenty of treasure, should keep us afloat for a few weeks at least. Aye, and I drew us a map of our own." Ioz half-heartedly assessed the spoils from the air-raid. "Not that it's any of my business, Ren, but if Jazhea seeks revenge on who else I think, then she would be wise to forfeit her own quest." The rugged helmsman concentrated on the above, surveying for any remote indication of rain.

"Who do you mean, Ioz?" Ren exclusively peeked over, wishing for detail.

"By my father's loyalty it's something I vowed never to speak of again. There's only one pirate I can speak of who can move quicker than Ten Gales and has never been bested in a duel, save for almost one time. From what I've been told, he has no scars because no one's defeated him with a sword, but he's been been in a deckfire..." Ioz droned with reflective consideration, checking out the dark water.

"Do you mean Liege Mizzen-Conquest?" Niddler rung in on the subject.

"Call him by his real name, Niddler." Ioz insisted to end more idiotic gossip.

"Are you done being vague and ready to enlighten us? We're a crew remember, we share our stories. Ioz..." Tula pried with a dynamic but repressed nerve. "What's with him?" The empath huffed of verbatim breath. She was filled apace with a certain torment, but not willing to let this awareness ruin her motivation. She prayed Ioz would relieve his affliction, and thus stop this new misery that was overwhelming her.

"It's in the past and it makes no difference to talk about it now, lay off. If we Are forced to fight Mantus, we'll take him out the same way we take out Bloth." The masculine buccaneer again donned his eyes to the absorbing tide, low and cemented in volume as he reassured himself. "I simply have a feeling that may be what is troubling her. Call it pirate's intuition, woman. I mean that she's fortunate to escape with her life, like our ecomancer is that though Joat is ruthless scum, he doesn't throw anyone before-age and in a bassinet overboard. It's just about the only redeeming trait of that barnacle-blasted son of a sea-pooch. Downpour is brewing! Take everything important below!" Ioz lightened his rhythm, peacefully diverging to another argument.

"You sure do like to play your own ego-conch. Again, Ioz, I think you're not saying enough about this." Tula refused to cease, this time it was Ioz's fault that her painful reception would not shut down. He would talk endlessly about a coral reef that he almost lost his life in, but not this.

"He's a deserter and a traitor, that's all. He left Zoolie and I along with his best underling, Vlor, among the dangerous Coral Reef in the middle of the ocean with no supplies to float back to the jitatan deck of the Maelstrom and he pawned it off as a mistake to Bloth to save his skin. Now for the last abysmal-winded time, come off it!" Ioz was almost red-faced by the time he finished his unsatisfactory answer.

"Then he was trying to kill you both, I'll wager. But why?" Tula only questioned more, purely out of full care.

"Because he would throw my blood into a monsoon before he would be any trustworthy sea-man! It's nothing important, so just let it sail on by!" Ioz unkindly snapped, so bugged by the racking detail to even consider.

"Here we go again." Niddler sighed as he innocently watched them bicker into evening, yearning for anything to munch on. He would settle for a tart minga-melon at this stage. No, a chewed minga. The Wraith sailed through the night.

The wind was hauling in good favor and the crew had amassed substantial headway toward their target. "Ren, do you have any idea where this Treasure might be located?" The leery driver tried to probe Ren's sense from steering, they had been stranding in the same direction for a very long time now. This plot of sea could have been untouched and uncharted.

Ren squinted his eyes to gander at the horizon. "No idea. I guess we'll just follow the Compass." Ren simply motioned as the blue jewel lit up in for him and continued to beacon North. It became eerily quiet as the ship traveled through a field of black with only the solitary and glowing light of the Treasure gleaming the way. Ever silently, the sky began to darken as if in a storm and even more opaque.

"What's with the weather?" Ioz worried as he scanned around, seeing the ashen clouds lurking in. "I don't like the look of this." He expressed. The campaign was out in waters you could traverse forever in and not find any land, they would need to be prudent. Stray dagrons and other uncanny creatures swooped overhead. There appeared to be a thick fog encasing all that was around them except the glow, which ringed the ship and was only beget by the Treasure.

Ren gawked about at his surroundings. The Treasure commenced to flash a mystifying pale and golden effulgence. "That's odd." Ren noted obscurely. "What can it be warning us of?" He verbally compelled, scouring around. That was when he noticed the face in the waves, he staggered back with marvel. "Father?!" He exclaimed, faltering under a doubletake. Bronze flesh and parallel eyes of ocean offset by a flowing beard of winter arrived as an image in the water. It surfaced within eyesight.

"Ren, my Son!" The conjure of the idol cried out. Tula and Niddler had run to where Ren was situated to see what was happening, their mouths gaped. "Beware! Beware the mist!" The old soul warned. Ren stilled with puzzlement.

"Mist?" Ren asked. He did not see any mist around, only fog.

"You are already being deceived, my Son! Beware!" The ghostly portrait of Rigel Primus exhorted before washing into nonexistence as quickly as it had come.

"Mist?" Tula repeated. "What did he mean by, we're already being deceived?" She pondered the exact questions as Ren, neither knowing what to make of it. The ecomancer figured it might be interpreted as someone betraying them, but that was impossible she thought. The otherworldly spark hadn't revealed any clues and every person she fathomed to be capable was gone, no longer journeyed with them.

"Look who's back." Ioz beckoned to the scene off the port, the crewmates darted the opposite way in heed.

Ren had been about to say something, but then the bombardment started as if on cue. He thrashed completely around and beheld the fireball discharge, flying at the wading skiff and barely missing. "The Maelstrom!" Ren stammered with a horror. The massive crusher was verging closer and barreling toward them at a surmounting rate of speed.

"We'll try to outrun them!" Ioz powered as he pulled the handle of the Wraith to approving winds. Tula stayed on the mast, altering the riggings accordingly. Niddler sturdily helped. The twain ships aligned and ended with the Maelstrom being a sheer blemish in back of the Wraith. Then the red floater veered to the right, putting more space between.

From the balcony behind the demure and promptly fleeing vessel, an invidious roar blew.

"Twist my soul! That boy thinks he can elude me, catch him! If that boy gets the 13th Treasure of Rule, I'll throw you all into the dark water!" Captain Bloth's enraged rant threatened the crew among him, cross that the Wraith was managing to retract from them at every wisp of the wind. "Mantus, launch the propeller. I want to see if our investment was worth the gold spent on it." He ordered his commander to use a different tactic.

"Yes, Lord Bloth." Mantus complied with a half-salute. He toiled on a giant switch of bone so burdensome to move that upon tugging with all his exuberance, it would not budge. "Mak Toi!" The lever finally flipped when he leaned and drove all his strength behind a shove, he flung on his knees before the former obstacle. Circumstances then required him to waddle back to embrace the wheel, and to get used to the increased speed from the Krelikhan-tail propeller that was under the keel of the ship.

"Fire the catapults! Open the hatch! We'll swallow them up!" Bloth's growling fury boomed another demand, another lever slammed into position.

From the Wraith, the four loyal shipmates witnessed their plight of the horrendous sight chasing them.

"Ay jitata! What's Bloth doing now?" Tula drastically panicked, flabbergasted as the monstrosity bounded at a speed never seen before. Less than a few moments did they have to ponder their spot. Manifold battery shots fired, Ioz had his hands full.

"Noy jitat! Did he make the Maelstrom faster?!" Ren floored with stunned revulsion in his pitch. The maw of the face proceeded to hulk over the defenseless schooner with impending devastation, already threatening to chew them up.

"That's impossible!" Tula screamed out with swelling eyes. Her stamina was zapped from last time, she instantly found out. Niddler wrought a calamitous squawk.

"Not for Bloth!" Ioz jarred with cynicism. Stony eyes becoming like barrels and like never before, he was convinced he would die in that moment. "What I wouldn't give to be at Zoolie's with a round and a waitress in hand! Chungoo lungoooo!" In a life-or-death move of bravado and something of luck, he managed to make the hardest turn he ever did make to fork away from the towering ship and the berserk captain. Objects on the deck of the bloodshot vessel crashed and flew in all directions as the barge came frighteningly near to careening on the ledge, darting in the opposite byway of the pursuer. The tetrad passengers of the Wraith, including the pilot, virtually ejected off from the railing. The monkeybird screeched and retained onto the lower portion of the mainstay for cherished life. "Hold on!" Ioz screamed once more as the Wraith now righted and had skid away from the devouring front of the enormity, facing toward the stern of the Maelstrom, but still angled at the hull. Bloth would have to turn around to catch them, this time. Ioz scrambled to the helm and steered away from the side out into the open sea.

"Noy jitat! That was too close!" Ren's dialect accelerated, heartrate returning to normal as he jumped to the fringe of the planking underfloor. He carried the Treasure that kept the dark water at bay carefully in his palm.

"We're not out of this dreadful sea, yet." Ioz sordidly judged, deeply concentrating. His jet scour focused on the wheel in front of him. Arrows came next and shouts of swashbucklers from their backs were heard. "Chungo lungo! Let's get that sail ready, toss some supplies!" He hollered and the crew readied themselves for a big chase at sea, but then it became deliriously quiet.

"What's that?" Ren pointed out with a critical poignancy.

"Those..." Ioz concerned himself with the direction of Ren's sign. "Are iceburgs." His lips moved with barren calmness. The Wraith skated by the monuments of white.

The ship above and several lengths away from the retreating Wraith had curtailed. The demonic sea-creature communed with the master of the freighter in a way that was unconditionally distracting.

"The boy has the 12th Treasure of Rule. The proxy of the almighty Oracle." Morpho hissed at the hefty captain, who he focused his flinty stare on.

"I know that, Morpho! What is the meaning of this interruption?!" Bloth gnashed at the wormy anti-human below him. He could not understand why Morpho had picked now of all times to indicate this. Immediately, a bump shattered his locomotion. "Mantus! Steer away from that iceburg! If that cruise-wrecker so much as scratches my hull, it will be your head I use to patch and mount the salutation-cove!" With the shake of a fist, he flew into a stricken emphasis at the scared second-in-command.

"I'm on it, Bloth!" Mantus reassuringly groveled as he departed from the ice-cold floe with nothing gone awry.

"How would you like to become immortal, Bloth? You will have power beyond your wildest dreams!" Morpho suggested with a slither to the evil Pirate Lord. Creepy and sundered air hung over the creaking bridge.

Bloth flickered a suspicious eye at this eyesore. "For what price, Morpho?" The plump Captain inquired of the macabre being, never was such a deal free.

Mantus had been about to say something, overhearing the conversation and not liking where it was heading. "Bloth! Morpho is-" The commander, who had deviated from the wheel to warn his lord was interrupted by a scathing reply.

"Mantus, I don't believe I ordered you to stop! I am conducting business!" Bloth barked at the feeble second-in-command.

"Yes, MiLord." Mantus deferred with a gruff sentiment, but he maintained a harsh leer on Morpho.

"My Master can make you into a dark disciple!" Morpho precariously grazed. "Then you will be able to pursue the Son of Primus for all eternity as you will have eternal life!" When Morpho advocated the offer Bloth shot a sagacious gaze at him.

Bloth narrowed an eye at the proposal and then twisted to watch the Wraith, which was now a voluminous distance away. He momentarily pondered. "I have my own fight to settle with the Son of Primus, that will not be helped by becoming one of your Master's pets!" The Pirate Lord expelled with candor. Though the Captain did not show it, Morpho had begun to worry him.

"But Bloth..." Morpho unscrupulously gurgled out. He started stalking toward the turgid and pale warmonger. "If you become a dark disciple, you will not be defeated!" Morpho's demented breath crawled, almost in Bloth's face now. The Captain instantly backpedaled.

"Except for the Treasures of Rule!" Bloth started in an obvious certainty of the truth. "This was not part of our deal, Morpho! Suggest your madness to someone who wishes to oblige!" He necessitated of the approaching demon in a pugnacious but increasingly nervous pitch. He backed up farther as the fanatic stretched a tentacle for his lip, the Captain's one honied-eye grew wide.

Morpho created a bizarre noise and began to shuffle toward the heavyset pirate. "That's too bad, Bloth. You are becoming a dark disciple anyway." Morpho's sinister words of covenant hissed. "The Son of Primus has the 12th Treasure of Rule, the prophecy is almost fulfilled!" The voice of the maniacal cultist became gravely cold with a dead blackness, only set off by the nightmarish and orange glitter of his inhuman eyes. "The Dark Dweller has need of you!" Morpho imitated a sound of the Dark Dweller himself, his signifying speech and inflection took on an otherworldly attribute. He stepped closer and fuller to the pallid Captain and his victims's mouth now hung open. He attempted to wrap a snaky appendage around the gross brigand's neck.

"Morpho stop this impudence at once!" Bloth demanded, now galloping in regression. Morpho would not desist so he employed his sword and swung with everything at the diabolical zealot. To his shock and horror, the immortal halted the sharp and destructive blade with only the limb.

"He was after our blood from the start!" Mantus howled as he scurried from the helm and now was brandishing his metal at the Dark Dweller's minion. "Stay away from Captain Bloth, repugnant worm!" The master swordsman outcried and whirled his shining cutlass at the hellion but in the similar action of his boss and his own utter terror, he was stopped by the vicarious hand. The excess of the infamous marauder's bodyguards met synonymous thwarting.

"Destroy him, Mantus!" Bloth fearfully yelled out with exposed trauma on his face as he tried to salvage his shifted edge from the tentacle's grip to strike again. "Throw him back to his reprehensible Master where he belongs!" He was manically upset and unable to uproot from the shattered station. Even with his strength he could not free his saber, which had been absolutely subdued by the duress of the Master of all evil. He awed at the attacking fanatic.

Mantus flailed and neither could he rescue his blade. "Natchoot!" He cursed and thrust his sword in a successive attempt to pounce, but instead found himself discarded. The aghast marauders of the Maelstrom gawked at safe limit from the scene.

"Captain Bloth, Konk think he know why-" Konk doddered from out of a cove on the deck, about to announce something but instead saw the beast that assaulted his boss and his boss staring at him in a mien planted with dread. "Oh, no..." The piglet drooped his saggy cheeks and his eyes showed stress. He stood paralyzed on a solo pegged-leg, the sense of what to do in this scene not yet occurring to him. Waves of harmful liquid crackled up over bony spikes from behind Morpho. Panicked moans of the crew filled the air.

"Once I have taken you as a contribution, Bloth, I will take the best of your crew and make them into my Master's dark disciples!" Morpho's malefic oath dangled over the surface of salt-sodden residue, the miscreant's eyes were the pure murkiness of an onyx void.

Far away from the Maelstrom, which barely motioned a wave in the ocean of black, the four crew members from a zestful drifter recognized something amiss where their adversary had been shadowing them in modest leagues.

"Ren what's going on?" The airborne companion soared over the platform of the petite schooner and threshed down to question with a stricken air.

"I don't know, Niddler. I can't see from here." The prince with a flaxen ponytail answered the large bird pattering around him, he had taken the rein. His eyes stirred to the vessel of the enemy, actualizing to capture a poor glance at the stem of dark water erecting a path up the portside of the massive warship.

Green and dingy floorboards creaked underfoot. Many pirates were hollering, barrels rolled to the side of the tilted ship. Dark water had started to saunter up the anatomical stronghold.

"Mantus, ready the scouts! Release the dagrons! Do whatever it takes!" Bloth wallowed through a drastic tirade, backing away awestruck and then bounding as the surreal fiend commenced to slink toward him in a pitiless chase. Somehow the creature had managed to become distracted and permitted him to flee but the halfbreed persisted to converge, and right for him. Bloth ran toward the bow of the carrier and discovered with a terror, the harnessing tendrils of black that were surfacing all over. He pounded back, screaming in another direction.

"The controls of the ship are halted!" The frightened commander blared in reply. "We can't go anywhere, there's too much dark water for scout!" The second-in-command daunted at the ratchet of the leviathan battler as a coil of ruin licked out at him. He cleaved his hands over his head. "Noy jitat!" Mantus's voice of desperation blunted out as he spotted the dark water beginning to splash the midriff of the oversized frigate. The enormous thud and the monumental tremor followed. Then, the atmosphere perforated with the sound never heard before.

"Mantus what that!" Konk shouted on a stumpy leg as he dove and plowed behind the helm where the commander of the Maelstrom cowered and ducked on the floor as if to shelter from a barrage.

"Shut it, gantha-pig! You aren't helping!" Mantus croaked out a nerveracking growl, bug-eyed and stowed lateral to the fat munchkin who had shrunk to a landing beside him.

Konk's eyes amplified like orbs when he saw what he did then. "But Mantus!" The pegleg pointed with a groan, by the expression plastered on his chubby face, the perturbed officer was forced to take a glance.

"Noy..." Mantus started to curse slowly as his voice trembled and shook. "Jitat!" It reverberated in the air. "That would our burial at sea, Konk!" He witnessed the shattered half of the Maelstrom rising up above the end part of the stern where he and Konk stooped. Many sailors jumped or fell overboard and met death in sombre whirlpool. Some of the dagrons had been liberated and few of them were flying off with passengers on backs or in claws, many falling and seeing their ends below. Another loud rattle could be heard as a mast toppled over, taking a casualty of a dagron and rider with it. The mighty captain had just managed to haul up to the jagged fringe of the sinking partition of the ship and made it to the tipping counter-side with a leap. Mantus and the pig-pirate mustered enough quickness to roll out of the way to keep from being crushed.

"Apocalypse, now or never!" The stray cry of a plunderer on a giant lizard flapped past, a mere allotment straggled in tow.

Bloth plummeted in an unforgiving crash against the protective railing of the stern, beaming up in dread of his life's work split in two. He petrified next to his main men and sought for any avenue out. His yellow eye focused on the path of smooth water left by the boy's ship and the Treasure that clung to it. "There!" He ground out a simple word and without a moment to spare, grabbed his second-in-command by the scrawny arm and flung him into the clear water below. Mantus screamed what he thought would be his last but then impelled to paddle in the trail when he realized he was in tame water. Bloth then made to jump off himself but Konk, his last crewman remaining, only ogled at him stupidly and fearfully. "Abandon ship, you imbecile!" Glowering at Konk with a dejected eye, Bloth heartbrokenly cracked out his last command as Captain of the Maelstrom. He slumped into the water below.

Konk looked stunned. He then skedaddled to the railing to plunge in himself, debarking in the water with a plop and catching up to Mantus and Bloth who were swimming away as fast as their arms would allow. "But Bloth!" Konk breathed out. "Ren is up that way!" The gantha-pig warned as he briefly paused from paddling, this had all happened too fast.

"I know that, you moronic half-masted pig-face!" Bloth growled and glared back at the chunky runt. "Do you want to die?!" The largest of the raiders quarreled out, Konk did not say anything and Bloth did not have the will to hit him. He bore back at what abode of the two halves of the Maelstrom, which were being encased in lethal fluid and rancorously sinking into the void. The pleasant water from the rear of the defection continued to disappear and veil with gloom, they would have to speed away.

"What do you plan to do?" Mantus managed to pant.

"Keep swimming!" Bloth answered. The drenching outbreak was inclining on the overlord and his men but they enabled to stroke through the road of pure sea that led to the Wraith. Releasing his breath, the brutish ex-captain climbed aboard the bow of the little crimson-ship and tumbled flat on his face. Soon to follow were his gangling ex-commander and the half-pint. The moment of awaiting ended as the three foul ones coughed up water.

"Well, look what the dark water's washed in!" Broadcasting was a voice from the deck, Bloth peeked up with a solo eye of amber.

"Not so tough without your ship, are you, Bloth?" Bloth's enemy, the platinum-blond prince, sported a ponytail and prated confidently with a smug smirk on his face. Behind him settled the pirate who used to crew on the destroyed ship, the pink ecomancer with eyes of jade and the brightly-fluffed monkeybird, all of whom had scored the best seat in the house for the grandest show in the twenty seas. "What are you going to do about it, naja-dog?" Ren proudly spurred again, all but boasting.

Bloth knew he was not in a good position when he sat up. He hoisted up to his feet and sneered, drawing his sword that he had managed to cart with him. Mantus, from next to him, lifted on knees and hacked to rid himself of the spritz. It had been then when Bloth noticed Ren was unarmed.

"I say we take them for a dip in the dark water!" Ioz bitingly goad, only half braggart. His blade was lashed as he tapped his fingers in a smart drum but Ren only stayed fist-to-hip, tailing a complacent glare at the unexpected visitors.

Bloth chuckled an amused laugh. He digressed momentarily to glimpse at Konk and Mantus who had coursed to their feet. "I'll tell you what I'll do about it, Son of Primus!" He asserted with low and sordid eminence as he rolled the sword at the side of Ren's midsection but he did not hit. He had caught Ren off-guard and scared. Only air evoked when the prince intended to draw his weapon.

"Noy jitat!" Ren let out a stunned gasp as the slicer nearly contacted. He came to the realization he did not have his blade, suddenly fighting Bloth and his men was not such a good idea. His blue eyes held a startled and humbled gaze for a instant, then he backed up. Ioz and Tula swarmed around, flashing their own metal. Niddler braced Tula's shoulders, prepared to strike. Mantus and Konk had both lambasted their weapons and were snarling cruelly at the owners of the boat, ready to advance. "Ioz, Tula, stop! Wait!" Ren disarrayed to his friends. He sighted Bloth grinning wickedly.

"What Ren? We have to attack!" Tula disorderly countered, her cutlass in her hand as she energized to give it her all.

"No! Don't!" Ren instantly cautioned. "Wait." Ren spoke a concise demand that then settled. Ioz and Tula twisted around to him, confused by his order to stop but also anxious to preventively backlash. He looked to his most reviled enemy in the twenty seas. "Bloth." He proceeded to say with obvious disgust in his resonance, he almost could not deliver the words without an aching nausea in his gut. "We have to form a truce." He felt sickened, and Bloth smiled.

Part ? The Darkest of Days

"Ren, are you insane?!" Ioz began to yell. "He is on our ship, you know how dangerous he is! We have him right where we want him! After all he's done?! And you see what the dark water did, if he gets the Treasure, we're all doomed!" He stunted in a drawback, entirely aggrieved by this suggestion. He charged at Bloth, formulating to belt a strike, and almost did. "If Ren won't get rid of you, kreld-eater, then I will!" The roar of Tayhojian man pierced the proximity. He muscled the thrashing sword with robust arms, but he was speedily met by the bulky cutthroat's blade.

"Ioz, spare your sword. If you're going to defeat me, you better find a crew that is half as worthy." Bloth nonchalantly stated and scoffed as he beat the pressing weapon away from him.

"Ioz, no!" Ren called out, Ioz backed up. Ren displayed his repulsion. "He has nothing to gain by attacking us now." He grimly apprised as he focused on the nemesis across from him.

"The Treasure!" Ioz exhorted in disagreement, detectable fright as well as loathing crossed his pretense.

"He won't risk his life or his men for it." Ren told with an aphotic sense of clarity in his conclusion, his eyes narrowed. This is what Bloth wanted. The Wraith, stable as it is, was not meant for a big fight. Bloth knew this, and he did not have anywhere to run back to. At this point, they were pretty much equally matched and on their own. Tula's abilities made her formidable, Ren himself could not be hurt and Ioz was stronger than he. Bloth was tough enough as an opponent, Mantus would be another problem for them. Konk might be stupid, but he could be a sneaky pest. Someone would be knocked overboard, should fighting break out. His enemy was afraid of the dark water and while Ren did not worry about himself, if Tula or Ioz, Niddler as well, were hurt he would never forgive himself. He also did not seek to visit the Dark Dweller's lair again anytime soon. He stared at Bloth, who indulged in an entertained chuckle once more.

"Good to see you're being reasonable, Son of Primus." Ren's archnemesis conducted with a twisted smile. Though everything he said was not true and he would risk his men to get the Treasure of Rule, Ren was doing everything he wished him to. This would give him time to plan. He and the prince would postpone their score. "This bilge-leech of a traitorous swab cut me off the pass. Larger tempests dampen our skies!" His rising temper marked to Ioz, who seemed ready as ever to defend his mates of the twenty seas. He pointed above to the blanketed shade. "We need someone to keep us safe from this pernicious curse that will fall upon us! Absolutely, I am the better choice of this inadequate crew forged in hardship." Bloth's volume evened but his conviction was in every way humorless.

"Now wait, no one said you could take over. What curse are you talking about?" Ren bid with repressed disunion, wordlessly challenging for any proof.

"Here we go. I don't care what he says, Ren, I will never trust Bloth. Not again." Ioz receded from the additional party, unrelentingly tense.

"Well you have better, Ioz, if you don't want to be leviathan grub by morning!" Bloth mercilessly chided with crossed arms. He did not stutter or relax with this new matter. Mantus approached while Konk unobtrusively tottered about.

"Great moons of Mer, I can't believe we're doing this again. Spit it out, Squid-lips, but if it's lies you're paying for it." Ioz growled but he retained his aggressive patrol of the invaders. He pronged his razor of steel at the offensive, slowly stepping away and shielding.

"That flying wench is an ecomancer more powerful than Salamantha! She can change her form, if you think she's Ren's deceased sister then you're charting a course for the Abyss! Is it any coincidence her name means a jinx from the ancient civilization of Stalagor? Foul circumstances happen when she is around, she named her dagron after a fortune-demon! How does she know such an ancient language unless she were a cursed harpy?! The other one she flies with is more dangerous. They can take the form of the departed relations of the men they're trying to deceive. They caused doom upon us because they want the Treasures of Rule for themselves. We can't let it fall into their hands!" Bloth imbued confidence in his viewpoint, unmovable in expression. Ren and Tula watched with burdened gazes, neither fully believed and would have dismissed it totally were it not for the instance of Bloth being truthful previously of the eco-witch Salamantha. In the case of the maniacal enchantress and her plans for the Treasures a truce was indeed necessary, and he was behaving alike.

"They can read the minds of beasts." Mantus appended with a superior nod.

"Mantus, I hope you realized the conditions of mortality when you signed your sword to working for Bloth, unless you'd like your end to come more abrupt." Ioz menaced with the draw of his sword in another tune, not at all impressed with the distinguishing narrative. "I said no lies, that includes making up tales. Explain how you know all this and even so, if they're that powerful, what should we do about them?" He incredulously renounced with an angled glower.

"She made the Maelstrom fall into Morpho's ploy. She controls her victims using this!" Mantus imparted as he released an amulet from about his neck to display it, the same one the pilot lass had been often seen with. "You can't, do anything, Ioz. Only Captain Bloth and myself know what she fears to disarm her." Mantus petitioned furthermore, in-line with his master's request.

"Jazhea said that necklace would bring her protection." Ren augmented with a leery eye at the chartreuse bauble. "How do you know it's not her? Explain yourself!" He did not trust as he sadly quavered from the swallowing possibility of Bloth being honest.

"Because I made her a meal for the Constrictus, you miserable boy." Bloth wisely denoted. Ren did not show his twinge of grief, but it did not seem to aid him much. Instead he immersed himself in disbelief.

"I mistakenly changed course from where we believed the dark water aligned." The avaricious bladesman comfortably recited.

"That would mean Jenna is in danger." The imperial questmate furrowed ever silently, he observed the glimpse of Ioz that let him know there was no going back.

"Is that why I doubted her at first, Bloth?" In an unexpected and conscious move, Ioz flashed his own corresponding pendant. The flat round of the sage surface could have very well been the second half to the strategist's carry, forged from the same mineral.

"Then it's a duplicate! One of her ploys, don't you see, you're all falling into her trap! That's what she wants you to think! She wouldn't deceive you, she only wants Ren because he's collecting the Treasures. Mantus would not change his route without my permission, unless he were under her trickery! She's a dagron-witch, you'll see! They both are! If you don't want us to be swallowed by a leviathan at sunrise like she warned us we would, you'll cooperate! Our sail will break down before the time of darkness unless you listen to me!" Bloth started to uproar in rush of his point. He lividly shuddered, compelling a sense of hostility and urgency.

"Dagron-witch my barnacle-leech's tail! Nice try but we know about the darkening too. Kreld-eater, I know this isn't any jitatan fake. If that jewelry of hers is so bad then just throw the jitatan talisman overboard, since you seem to know so much." The offended seafarer crassly argued. Ioz was growing more cantankerous as this spat drawled on. Being confronted with his former captain was not anything he rejoiced in, but to have to listen to this manipulative spiel he knew all too well made him ever more contemptuous.

"If we do that, we will die! We're at her mercy, don't you see! Should she return she'll torment us again, we have to plan while she's away. It's how the curse works, maybe you don't believe us at all but when the time comes those who listen to reason will be victorious! Besides, Ioz, you've seen some things in your pirating time, have you not?" The king of the oversea crooks abruptly darkened in presence. Ioz wearisomely shunted away from the topic at it's mention.

"Bloth, there's no reason to bring that up again. Very well, our truce is made but only on the condition you stay out of our way. The Wraith is not yours, no matter what circumstance may befall us." Ioz sturdily agreed, he put away his armament.

Ren debated, he confined the Treasure in his hand. "If you try to steal this the deal is off!" The prince threatened crisply. He was not completely sure if he could back it up, but he would have no choice. "We'll drop you off when we go ashore." He glowered and uttered in a judicious tone, the adversary's slanting gape fell upon the glassine gem clenched in his hand.

"Hand over your weapons, too!" Ioz appended a demand. He was deeply umbraged, but holding back.

"My, my, we are demanding." Bloth derided in pseudo humor. "Very well." Malignant words meant to appease his competitors tapered off. "Mantus! Konk!" Bloth addressed his men in an adept order and they bowed their necks.

Mantus transferred his sword with little more than a cold stare. Ren gripped it and handed it off to Tula. Konk passed his cleaver with a scowl and a withheld grin as if musing on something he found to be delightful, Ren motioned for Niddler to take that weapon. Bloth himself handed over his own blade and to Ren's shock, he could barely enable to lift it. He quickly carted it off to Ioz, being sure not to give his foe the chance to mock him. Lamentably he strove to be sure not to exhibit any weakness. Unfortunately, Ren noticed the icy smile aimed at him. Ren and his crew distributed the weapons somewhere underneath, which they hoped would not be uncovered. Niddler found the perfect nook under a few boards. When Ren returned topside, Ioz and Tula pulled him aside.

"Ren, you realize when we get to port, he's going to attack, right?" Ioz took his blight up with Ren.

"I know." The prince replied uneasily.

"How do you plan to get us out of this sea-trap?" The brunet deckman insisted to hear some kind of scheme from his compatriot.

"I don't know, Ioz, but I'll think of something. There's still time to plan, but you should stop looking to me as if I have all the answers." Ren made a serious vow, but he could not be more unsure of himself. His gaze displaced. Ioz was right, they would have to think of a plan, and soon. "Tula, I'm worried myself about the idea of that stone being a way for her to curse us. What if it was why we almost went down in the dark water after we couldn't find the Treasure last time? She could have left it on the ship." Surprisingly, Ren considered the possibility.

"She did betray us before, and for all we know she could still be working for his legion. I'm not liking something about the way Bloth is acting. Mantus is not handing over that brooch, and it looks like a drabulin-jipped forgery of mine." Ioz steamed over the most recent events, not ceasing to monitor the wrecking opportunist for one leviathan-flutter of a wink. He polished the green ornament under his grip.

"Then what do we do? If what Bloth says is true, then Ioz is right that we're doomed anyway. Salamantha lost her power over her subjects with a kiss maybe, but in what way would we break the spell of these unknown troublemakers? If she can curse jewelry, I can try to do is use my ecomancy on it but I can't promise anything if she is truly that powerful." Tula tiresomely exacted for a clue. Again, she could think of nothing more than her own emotional state, and the one of those in her neighboring locate.

"He did say Mantus changed course. So maybe if we stay on course, we'll avoid a-" The regent tried to browse through every logical consequence.

"I think I may have an idea, Ren." Tula whispered to him, aspiring not to be too conspicuous. Her eyeline shifted to the three rapscallions below, who did not notice her.

"What is it, Tula?" Ren solicited with tenderness, hoping for a viable suggestion.

The three destructive men on the lower level of the bow ensnared a glance at the others who conversed and this made Tula leery. "I'll tell you later Ren, I don't want to talk about it right now." The ecomancer nervously lipped, her eyes moved to the later.

"So now that is resolved, we'll have to take double shifts on watch. We'll need at least two hands on deck at all times. And we all better pray to the sea-gods it rains within two moonrises or you don't want to know what we'll be washing down our feast of galoshes and britches with." Ioz wholly implied. Ren nodded in understanding to Tula as she rounded away. The unapproachable trio had set sights on Ren in that instant and the prince wearily bore back at them, he then roamed to another corner on the ship. Ioz secured the wheel, never letting his eyes blink.

"Mmm, delectable goija sticks! I haven't had food this good in so long!" Niddler smacked his beak and squawked jovially as he pattered on the deck to crunch on his scant but tasty snack. It was unfortunate that he had been shallow on minga-melons to eat ever since the Wraith had stopped in Pandaawa and then on. He enjoyed himself in an endless bliss until he heard a growl opposite him.

He saw the three staring at him. First the sleek man, Mantus, who was leaning up and forward of the rail to solely gawk. The same thief then faced his scrutiny away to peer out to the sea of dolor and did not seem to bother. The chubby man, Konk, stood with a half-masked back and his flabby cheeks scowled at Niddler with what seemed to be contempt. Konk did not like monkeybirds, this Niddler knew. Nidder had only been frightened when he saw Bloth extend to him with the leer of a corrupt yellow grimace and an immoral gnarl. The spooked monkeybird squawked outloud and flew off to spot his buddy.

"Ren!" Niddler yawped. "Can't you do anything? They're scaring me!" The red-winged monkeybird shouted as he happened upon Ren, who was inspecting a map.

"Try to ignore it, Niddler." Ren voiced calmly, well-focused as he switched his eyes at Niddler and continued to squint down at the paper.

"What are you looking at, anyway?" Niddler interrogated him.

"Trying to find the nearest port from here, perhaps even where the next Treasure is." Ren candidly explained. He flicked his blue scour to see if anyone was looking. He investigated the simple and plainly-drawn map.

"Did you find it yet?" Antsy Niddler nagged again. He more than clearly did not like this situation.

"No!" Ren yelled a whisper. Highsun had not yet presided for the flustered scaredy-bird to distress. He rolled up the sketch and toted it with him. He footed up the stairs and Niddler followed him up to the helm where Ioz poised and kept watch. Ren noticed Tula stationed with the shipmate, she beckoned to him.

"Please tell me we've found anything." Tula rolled her stare away from the royal to hope for a vague instance of direction among the haze.

"Nothing. I wouldn't be a fool for thinking Kuunda led us to starve out here, with such delightful company." Ioz could not see anything except the same wretchedness on every field of vision. The idea of steering into circles had crossed his thoughts, though he did all viable to lay them to waste.

"But I can't starve, not until I've had a last meal!" Niddler ached at any slight mention of the word starve. To console himself he waddled on the ledge of the bridge.

"Niddler." Tula swiftly invoked. "Can you make sure the rig stays put? I need to talk to Ren for a while." She charged the flying primate and he unenthusiastically obliged. Tula ushered Ren into the lodging.

"Sure Tula." Niddler softly whimpered as he viewed the two people who would protect him disappear. He abode in a pause and then flapped away to do what he was assigned.

Tula and Ren paced into the room. Tula closed the door, she made sure no one was listening and no one could hear from outside. "Have you found a port yet?" Tula implored him, seeing him ferry the scroll in his hand.

"No. There are not many ports near this part of Mer, unfortunately." Ren distinctly stated. The boat drifted genuinely into the middle of nowhere, competently flowing North but without much nearby. Tula borrowed the map from him and gave it a once over.

Tula forged a noise of thought. "I think I know what we can do Ren." The ecomancer announced with a design coming to picture.

"What is it, Tula?" Ren incited as he leaned contiguous to the map she leased.

"I remember once learning there was a hidden levitating-island far North that is home to many wild white-dagrons. It was before Avadasia's time so I don't know if they would be there still. If we're stranded where I think we are it should be the next land ahead and if I can use my ecomantic powers to get them to take Bloth and his thugs back to shore, I think we'll have an advantage over him when we come to port." Tula analyzed as Ren then mulled it over.

"Will your powers last that long? If the dagrons are even there anymore, they would have to fly a distance. I didn't think you could do that." Ren pointed out an overt flaw in the scenario.

"I wouldn't be without the knowledge Teron has taught me, I can already control the Wraith. Dagrons and all moving life are of the growth element of the Spirit, if I can read their cries I think we can pull it off. We'll have to be just close enough. It will be difficult but I think it's our best shot, Ren. It will drain my energy a lot, so I'll have to be careful. He won't be able to follow us back without the Treasure once he's there, if the dark water is as bad there as it is here." Tula described the schematics of the plan, which made sense. Even though Ren had been doubtful Bloth would fall for such a scheme, he would likely go with the deal.

"Alright, Tula. That's what we'll do." Ren confirmed the procedure. Even if this plot worked, the instinct in his gut told him Bloth would be back. Bloth would always be back. However, this was the better arrangement they would have to work with right now. He began to walk to the door after concluding business.

"Ren, wait." Tula sought his immediate attention. Ren diverted before he left, focusing again on the ecomancer with worriment. "There's something different with Ioz, he's not acting like himself. He's not acting like...Ioz." She at last confessed at the straight demeanor of the burdened captain.

"Honestly, Tula, Bloth and his men are here and I don't like it either. I'm sure he'll feel better once we come to port." Ren moderately assumed his perspective on his shipmate's cause for concern. Tula usually didn't row with Ioz in times of turbulence.

"Listen, Ren, I know it makes less sense from a non-ecomantic perspective but I sense real trouble with him. His behavior just isn't...right. There's something else going on." Tula relentlessly petitioned for an honest backer in this cause, her pitch flat and serve. Ioz was never going to tell her himself, Niddler was a great companion to her as well but he did not understand things like Ren. Ren was always the partner she relied on in every struggle, but her discord with Ioz wasn't anything new to him by now.

"If he's wrought up on something then I'm sure he'll tell us when he feels ready, he knows he can trust us if it's something important. We already know a lot about his history and you know he isn't much for talking about things that trouble him. Let's try to focus on what we need to do right now." Ren sighed, soundlessly putting an end to further debate. He needed to return to deck, and hope Konk wasn't trying to sneak into the cubbyhole to help the pirate crew.

Tula didn't say any more. She would have not been provoked by Ren's scorn if this were any other feeling but sheer heartache, and the more overpowering fear. Not for himself, but for someone else. She didn't blame Ren for being stressed and not wanting to deal with anything unnecessary. He was just too trusting. Too naive, and for once, Tula hated every part of it. Something was wrong with Ioz and she wasn't going to let it down. The man and the woman spun around in surprise at the door cracking in the dimly lit cellar, they jerked from nerves.

"Ren, would you mind giving me a hand on deck-" Ioz started to say before he desisted, he saw both his friends in the room and they seemed to be talking. The two of them flit to face him. They felt relief when they saw it was only Ioz. Ioz had strangely eyeballed the pair, almost intrigued now. He settled his eyes on Tula.

"Oh, right!" Ren concurred as he pursued Ioz's voice from the doorway. He smiled at Tula on the way out and mouthed to her the words about the idea, Tula then just occupied.

"Is everything ok, Tula?" Ioz examined her with concern, and maybe something else he was putting out of his mind.

"Yes, I'm fine Ioz. Ren and I were just talking about the plan." Tula confessed but then she sounded slightly embarrassed, she shrugged it off. "Oh, I've got to see how Niddler is faring with the sail!" She stirred with a start. "I'll be right out!" She animated consciously and gamboled through the doorframe before he could talk to her any longer.

Ren returned to topside and to his amazement, Bloth was not screaming or shouting. Rather, the oxlike villain was quietly sulking near the ledge of the deck with his arms crossed and browsing out into the dead sea. Ren tried to avoid confrontation as much as possible. He helped Tula maintain the sail but she had reigned things under control. He sauntered to the otherside of the deck where Mantus and Konk had supposedly slunk off to, he did not intend to do anything, but he overheard their goading conversation.

"Konk bet 10 gold coins Bloth kill crew tonight!" Konk bellowed out with an absurdly stupid and hiccuping laugh.

"How did you even take gold with you, you swine?" Mantus growled out at the piglet lowermost, rendering a buggy and suspicious slant of a glare.

"Konk always have gold!" The pegleg reached into his pocket and pulled out a heavy sack of coins, chortling again. "Mantus not have gold?" He insinuated boorishly and foolishly.

"Of course I do, worm!" Mantus crassly responded, sounding insulted at the assumption he did not have any money.

"Then place wager!" Konk obnoxiously insisted. His fat face grinned as much as it ever did.

"You brainless barnacle! Bloth won't kill them tonight, that would be a foolish move! If you bet with me, you'll lose pig-brain! He'll wait until we get to shore to dispose of them." Mantus demonstrated superiority with a nod of his head to the stout pirate below him.

"How you know that? Bloth have Bad temper!" The immoral piglet snorted.

"Because I'm his second-in-command, darva-worm!" The snaky man retorted in a snub.

"No you not! You not have job on Maelstrom anymore!" Konk ironically chuckled.

"Neither do you!" Mantus blustered with a snarl.

"Enough!" Ren shouted out before he knew what he had done. He was called insane earlier, but now he truly felt like it. Everyone on the ship jut eyes at him after his entreaty, which he realized was an awful and stupid mistake. It was too late, his cover was blown. Now he no longer held the innocence of ambush on his side. The two who were having their quibble glared at Ren and prowled off in the other direction. He caught his breath only to scan around and see his most dreaded foe staring him right in the eye. The sky covered in an unimpeachable gray of fog that lacked of almost any beacon. Ren peered out at the water that was deluged in total black, only the narrow circle around the Wraith formed a peak through the perfect darkness that bridged from horizon to meridian. He did not sleep at all that night. He was fairly certain that Ioz and Tula did not. Niddler however, had recessed to a nap.

"Psst. Boy." Ren jolted when listened to the familiar summon vying for an audience.

"What do you want, Bloth?!" Ren stumbled backward, utterly flabbergasted that the rival could sneak up on him so instantaneously.

"What do you say, we form a little...alliance." Bloth whispered with a hardly discernible hint when he advanced to the quavering aristocrat.

"An alliance? What? What kind of trickery is this? There's no alliance between us, you're going to try to steal the Treasure of Rule from us when we get out of here." The prince stood his ground, not allowing any finagling to take place between himself and the ex-pirate lord.

"Actually, there's something else I have in mind. See him? He's out to get all of us. I will have those Treasures of Rule but in the meantime, we have to take him out." The grandiose scoundrel motioned to the laying frame of Mantus, who was strewn out on the nearby railing, merely munching upon a minga-melon and humming a shanty.

"He doesn't look harmful to me." Ren was now more settled in phrasing as he shot one assured inspection at the lounging sea-crook. He drifted scrutiny to the snoring Niddler, who was asleep without a care.

"Guess who purchased the Securitat from Jargis." Bloth indicated with a smooth mention and the shield of a hand. Ren narrowed his eyes.

"You're lying, Bloth." Ren irritably dismissed.

"Am I?" The terrorizing seafarer made pleasantries. "He has an entire network, and a stand-in at every port. He doesn't go by Mantus everywhere, boy. Ask him if he knows Mizzen-Conquest of the Janda-town Jewelry Market. Jargis sold him the legion after abandoning Pandaawa, like he sells him everything. And worse, his mind isn't his own. I'll fathom he's under Her control as we speak." He keenly emphasized and pointed to the singing sailor whom for once, seemed perfectly carefree in his watch out to sea. "At least we'll be on a good standing, should those gill-necks think about abducting us again. Eh, Ren?" Bloth leaned down to croon, roping Ren in a friendly shoulder embrace.

"Aghh! Don't even mention that. You sure are cheery for someone who's just lost everything." Ren pulled away as much as able, marginally vocalizing his disgust at such debauchery.

"Is it wrong to try to lighten circumstances?" The brute verged away, but still too close for comfort. His syrupy melody was more unsettling than bolstering.

"Of course it's not, but you never do that. Why are you asking for my help?" Ren quarreled in something of disorientation.

"Really, Son of Primus. Why do you think? Look at him over there...Plotting." Bloth shared an incriminating hush directed at Mantus. Ren skeptically squinted at the nautical bettor once more.

"For golden treasures of the sea, we'll steal and cheat as we bid on bones of glory, without their assent we'll play and we'll bet, swallowing swigs of ol' saps and filling maidens'-" Mantus continued to joyfully chant his shanty into the night until he choked on a minga-melon seed and proceeded to hack to free it from his throat. "Natchoot!" The rapacious pirate expelled with a chuck of the rind into the dreary gulf before tossing his streaming mane and settling in the opposite posture to snooze. "Atlases, with coins and maps." Mantus yawned and sighed as he touched the Realm of Sweet Sand.

"You're trying to stir up trouble. Thanks for the offer, Bloth, but I think we'll worry about ourselves." Ren declined with altruism and changed his byway of promenade from the manipulative foe.

"Suit yourself, boy." Bloth shrugged and confidentially bent down to Ren before lumbering away. "Oh, there is something else, boy. That wench, Solia is her name. Know her? You probably don't want to know about her being killed and replaced by one of those disciples, earning her the proper reward for...being a thief among my men. Ask Ioz." He gave the gawking lad a firm slap on the back before his parting between. Ren could not help but feel a shy uneasy.

From the cloak of the starless eve, a full-grown mercenary looked over. Unlike he who always survived harder Ren had been wearied by this Quest like never before and he knew it, he needed to watch the lad for slip-ups. It was now Bloth whom he questioned. "Maybe things are different now." Ioz mused as he morosely resumed his post.

It had been sometime after the odyssey had been making headway through the murky tide when what could be seen of the sun retracted down below the skyline. The tedious and sombre miasma did not allow much light to burst through. The pale-haired royal watched with glazed-over attention at the wheel to steady a stalled craft, the heroic pirate and the ecomancer were down beneath and scrambling to find some essential supplies needed for the jib. It was fine earlier. The monkeybird was supposed to be guarding the sail, but had taken a break to eat, or to gnaw anyway.

The compartment channeled with a flickering glow from dangling lamps overhead.

"Scot pango to Toishuok's scum-closet." Expletives rattled from behind a cache box. Ioz unluckily patted his hand into a pigeonhole but stalled too far to the left, he was eminently irritable ever since this exchange had taken place.

"Wait, Ioz." Tula cut short his hunt with a conjure. Unnoticed behind the pair rested an untold physique.

"What is it now?" Ioz insensitively humored the pestering bother of his attention. He stretched himself away and up from the narrow breadth of the alcove.

"Nothing, nevermind. Where's the spare clevis?" Tula came off the subject, separately diverting.

"Tula, I told you a leviathan's song ago I was carrying it." Ioz suppressed a growl as he cycled around to greet his forward-facing friend. In his palm he displayed the silver pin of her inquest. "You think my posturing of a pirating prowess at every tack and pull is something I delight in, how much older are your siblings to you? I was in Tayhoj for one year after Raymit and I were old-and-young-salts, up until his sailor's end, and all I heard from Solia were questions about whether what I did was an answer to her nighttime fears and if it paid more than jitatan cargo-boating. You want to know what you shouldn't, well let me tell you, woman, you'll know and this isn't any pirate's tale. The lifeblood and the bane of my very existence happened on the same day, and if you don't believe, baby sister still sleeps like a bone-shift watchman. I was twelve and Solia was seven, we had recently received a package from a client who needed delivery all the way to Valjen." He virtually rambled onto a frigid but open rave.

"All the way to the South Pole?" Tula took his temporal intermission from recollection to express her profound disbelief.

"Uncle was really sore about it." The rigid buccaneer commented. "Anyway, we needed to go there and stay for a time. In exchange, uncle received payment from the chosen residents of the pirate-nation. Then we set course to return home." Ioz carried on with his narrative, wavering only to poke his ebony discs about the uncommonly quiescent den. "The return bundle contained ore taken from a pirate-ship, right? Well, when we all saw land again it was the first thing we played with on the shoreline while the adults were gone, it was like being actual pirates to us, but our game had drifted to a peculiar version of Bluebeard and the Kelp-root. We planted the ore in the sand and watered it with another bottle from the ship. We even marked it off and covered it precisely to make sure no one would tamper with it." He gingerly described with a solid will. His leading eyes darted twice around the room, seeming evermore uncomfortable as this story unfurled in his memory. He did not meet on the third attendance, who was farther than what could be noticed.

"And?" Tula awaited a continuation. Her ear internally twitched to a noise analogous to one created by a leap, she rotated her head a measly degree. The muted tinker of glass touching wood vibrated the floor.

"When we went back and uncovered it, there wasn't ore, there was gold. Endless amount for a twelve and seven-year-old, there was no trace of tampering on our game. Everything was just-so. Leaves were stomped into the exact placement, the exact design of a goija kissing a saetail Solia had faithfully and lovingly drawn with her thumbs was still under the delicately balanced umbrella of rocks, and do you know what happened?" After vocalizing the explicit and uncanny details, Ioz's duration was becoming more disturbing as his tale sustained. His lip was visibly shivering and even though the cupboard they were in was dry and hot enough to cause perspiration, a hoarse volume could have taken the guise of a foreign other.

"What?" Tula prompted for the end, at this point she was frustrated and partially wished he would just spill it.

"We couldn't find a trace of the ore still in sight. We were going to spend the gold on ourselves, and try to grow more. Then Solia dropped a single drabul of this gold, which was solid in every possible way into the water by the shoreline and the most wicked spate of jitatan kreld-blige a twelve-year-old seapup had ever set eyes on resulted. Baby sister is still terrified of dark water now. She won't even touch her feet to the sand if she sees any on the horizon, and can prevent it." Ioz's breath puffed with in an almost unnatural factor. He didn't lift or move his vision, rather he kept it still and focused.

"You're really going to have to be less vague." Tula was closely certain that she would need to coax her colleague for any more distinct clarification. For some consequence yet to be discovered, she could listen to the sizzle of the waves crashing from outside. It was something she often blocked out at this season in her aptitude to experience every flavor of life from the realm of natural marvels, but on this day she could sense everything. Everything, except what she needed and wanted to.

"No one else could protect Solia, and she wants to pretend it never happened. This invisible thing that turned that ore into gold...to dark water. I know mother wasn't responsible for my loss at sea. Should I claim it, the inheritance she left me is bigger than any chump change I'll earn out of this Quest and I didn't crew with Bloth for two years twice because I wanted to run away from home or wanted revenge on the man. Woman, I know you think I'm a sea-bum for leaving home and anyone good I've ever met. Well guess what, Z.M.Q. is on this ship, and anything under his mark belongs to him, which is everything on the Wraith. You don't know a fortunate fate from a cursed one. We're fortunate none of us are only screaming those letters by now." Ioz snappily tossed Tula a ratchet with the representation of the Z.M.Q. symbol and as he had nervously found out, he could not say anything.

"What does Z.M.Q. have to do with anything? No one has said anything about Z.M.Q. controlling dark water or turning ore into gold. Z.M.Q. is human, right? Three pirates like Bloth...and his main men. But Bloth and Konk, why Z and Q?" The ecomancer quivered. Shadows from fish-bone trophies in the room began to spin into cadaverous deformities, if only in Tula's mind.

"No, he is capable of jitatan trickery. Also, no. That's clever but Z.M.Q. is like no other. He is only everything the Maelstrom is and more, and he's real as Bloth is a manipulative captain. I think Bloth gets what he deserves but I concerned of other things than whether he would get his payment in Kuunda's Kingdom." Ioz appeared to resume a normal posture on his recount, but his tone was as barren as ever.

"What do you mean?" Tula verged on agitation when she rounded a curled wrist to the fringe of her hip, loosing what Ioz presented her with during their gelid conversation.

"I mean I believe in magic, and that was no ordinary magic I've ever seen. That was something else. I know it was something else, and believe it or not, I wasn't like Ren back then. Besides, Z.M.Q. bears a tattoo of a golden ring sewn into his abdomen...through uhh, a friend." Ioz bid Tula one more stolid acknowledgment before he digressed and walked away.

"What about the Maelstrom?" Tula was mercurial to shoot after his trail, but she was too late. Ioz had already slipped out the door to make his way above. In this state she would be incapable of glaring at the pair of glaciers in the shadows, watching her. "Ay jitata, am I the only one who makes any sense on this boat?" Tula's voice cracked from disappointment, as she was very near to crying. Miserably, she couldn't at all grasp what he was covering up. Ioz's pain impaled and stabbed into her, but she could not understand a single thing.

Ren was in a daze, a tired one. He harmonized the boat through the otherwise horrendous waters, which only moved themselves as it swayed. He heard footsteps behind him and jerked around to meet gaze with the competitor yet again. The grandeur and pallor ogre was parading into the hollow cabin in the back, the slick conman and the potbellied midget soon followed and shut the door. Ren retained the map and everything important he packed with him, of course. He tried not to worry himself. He then heard arguing and bickering, a loud shout. He had been about to do something until he saw that the fat man was ejected from the room, the prince watched him hobble down to the deck near Niddler. "Niddler, can you make sure that winch is staying put?" Ren notified the avian below. He boggled at what was taking Tula and Ioz so long.

"Sure, Ren!" Niddler chipped in as he pattered up to check the alignment of the stagnant sail above. Konk was next to him. "What are you doing here, piglet?" Niddler quizzed the plump looter with a suspicious scowl, attempting to finish his morsel.

"Bloth kick Konk out cause Konk being pain..." Konk grumbled at the monkeybird.

"Haha. That's funny, Konk." Niddler snorted a flat quip at the annoying pegleg and shifted his green rings from his meal in an untrusting supervision.

"Haha! Konk wring monkeybird's neck!" The piglet sneered and growled, approaching the red avian with threatening and greasy arms.

"Re-n!" Niddler caught on and commenced to scream for his master with a fretful and clever yowl but Konk grabbed his beak and stopped after that.

"Oh! Me mean, Konk be monkeybird's...friend!" Konk grinned stupidly and patted the monkeybird on the head in a fake gesture that was met with two emerald-hued and irritated bird eyes.

Ren had been so engrossed in watching the antics between the shrimp and the monkeybird as he stayed at the wheel that he noticed a little too late the scraggy scavenger and dingy strands of slate, who tread out of the hold with an empty ale-bottle.

It had been the next day when the crew was running through deep waters, even farther North than before. The surroundings had changed, now plentiful along the course were tall pillars of stone blocks stacked one upon the other. Several were bigger than the Wraith itself and stood lavishly into the still-bleak sky. The stupendous creations reached into the heavens, as distant as sight could make out. Ioz had resumed his driving post, Ren and Tula were monitoring deck.

"Full sail! Let's ride this gale home!" Ioz shouted from the helm, he steadied the spindles with his hands and the wind was not throwing any resistance. Occasionally he needed to twist around a pillar, but he had not been presented with anything he couldn't handle. "Looks like the tide is in our favor, at this rate we'll arrive before the next moonrise and maybe we won't have to chew our leathers. I'm surprised that Bloth is so peaceful. I thought that leviathan bilge-eel would be giving us more trouble." Ioz senselessly deliberated the foe's dormant status, thinking some sabotage would have taken place by now.

"Don't say that!" Ren and Tula simultaneously squealed at him. Suddenly, a tremor shuddered the ship.

"Noy jitat! What was that!" Ioz blurted, grappling to keep the wheel consistent. The Wraith faltered.

"Seaquake?!" Tula gasped with bewilderment. The rumbling would not stop, she clenched onto the rope she had secured in her arms. She mustered a glance at Ioz, who found himself getting knocked from the mechanics. "Ay jitata!" She cried out.

"Out of the way, vermin!" Bloth tumbled out from the side with a punitive remark and elbow-bumped Ioz away from the wheel, taking it himself. He steered in another direction and the platform balanced slightly, but still rocked.

"Chungo lungo! By Daven's beard you'll die, jitatan sea-scum!" Ioz got up from where he lay to nurse his scalp and blare out, throwing a punch at the neighboring giant that was trying to take over. This caused Bloth to roar and scrap him against the ridge.

"I'm just trying to stay alive, fool! If you were half as shape with a ship, I wouldn't need to take over!" Bloth absolved in response as he spurred the ship to smoothly turn away until it shook again and he lobbed back from the helm. Ioz regained his footing and started piloting again.

"Ay chungo chipungo! We'll be dead before we even reach shore! You're going to get us all killed, you dirty dartha-eel!" Ioz frighteningly hollered back as he reclaimed his place. He sported the vessel West, away from where he believed the seaquake was presiding from.

"You don't know what you're doing!" Bloth uncontrollably growled from the ground. He had just sat up and he grabbed Ioz by the ankle, tossing him back. He vaulted for the controls again. The fight began and Ioz slugged a fist at the head of the bloated cutthroat and Bloth snagged the dusky-haired swashbuckler by the throat. The Wraith churned.

"We have to stop them!" Tula urgently alerted to Ren, who was at her side and the two of them ran to swing up the steps.

"Ioz, you'll never find an end to your misery!" Bloth chuckled a cruel and terrorizing laugh as the resisting pirate tried to claw at the heavy and blanched hand, glowering with dreading and hateful eyes of swart. "I'll show you to where your-" Bloth gnarled an unfinished threat when the crew squalled out and someone attempted to drag him away.

"Enough! Enough! Enough! This is too dangerous!" Ren screamed out, with furious blue eyes he felt ready to tear his flowing locks of gold from his scalp. He flailed his fists through the air. Bloth's pressure had loosened on choking Ioz's neck as Mantus and Konk tried to pull the aggressor back as well. Tula propped her cutlass in her hand, intense and ready to tenaciously defend her friends.

"Someone is going to fall overboard into dark water!" Niddler whimpered timidly from the rooftop of the cabin, where he was perched. He lifted himself into the sky toward the mainmast.

"It won't be me!" Bloth indignantly boasted.

"No, Bloth!" Mantus wrenched on the hulking arm of his former captain with shot eyes, panic seeping into his words.

"Konk don't want Bloth to get Konk killed!" The terrified Konk tugged on the other arm of the brutal degenerate. The skirmish subsided and the ship leveled out for a moment, but still persisted to swing wildly against the waves.

Bloth slowly lifted to his feet and Ren drew a deep breath, the regal salvaged the helm. The sea was calm and then it flared up again, this time with a great and protruding wave of shade, the dark water reared up out of the vista and hung as if it were attached to something underneath. The split company stared up with wide and howling eyes, Bloth then forcefully took the wheel.

"Bloth!" Ren got up off the floor and could barely protest before the shadow that appeared before them revealed itself to be a full-sized leviathan, which had been trapped halfway through the abysmal opacity. "Leviathan!" Ren's eyes grew ample as he murmured below his air.

"Noy jitat!" Ioz yelled out with awe. Bloth was steering them away as the tide crashed. The leviathan used it's size to slam into the Wraith and attempted to wrap itself around the ship, the sailors screamed when they learned the wheel was stuck.

"Bloth, let...go! You bilge-eating...sea eel!" Ren struggled through gritted words to pry the spool away from the bitter clamp of his enemy, but it instead remained stationary and did not move at all, even without being touched. The leviathan uplifted the hull, then dropped it.

"It's going to eat us!" Niddler shrieked out in cowardly-monkeybird squawks.

The leviathan angrily thrashed it's head against the Wraith with a bray from it's elongated abdomen. It hit the crow's nest and snapped off a portion of the mast, which came crashing down on the deck.

"By the blood of the twin moons!" Bloth groaned in frustration.

"Do you kiss your mother with that mouth, Bloth?" Ioz sorely instigated, egging on his foe.

"You're one to talk!" The hideous ogre crisply retorted.

"Hold on, I'm going to try to communicate with it!" Tula adjured the calm gust to infuse as she caromed toward where the leviathan was adhered and spread out her hand, shutting her eyes. She peeked into the beast's heart and she learned her upset of partial entanglement in the dark water. She honed on it's pain. It did not want to eat them, it badly wanted to get out! Her eyes cracked open. "Ren!" She called out to announce the fortunate news. "She means us no harm, she's just upset because she's trapped in dark water! She wants to go free!" Tula sympathetically exclaimed doubtless in her mind. The leviathan had curved it's head down to Tula's palm and was making gentle noises.

"Really, Tula?" Ren expressed hope, astounded and joyful. "That's great! We'll take the Wraith in close enough so it can go fre-" The ecstatic prince was then cut off by Bloth's yanking away of the wheel. The evil pirate was not only speeding away from the monster, which only made it angrier but seemed to be aligning it into a position among the lmeston columns where it would be stuck. "Let go, naja-dog!" Ren fought with his heaves, resolute on returning to the helm but he was slapped away.

"This should take the fight out of it's fins!" Bloth cackled a wicked laugh as he produced a vial of odd liquid. Ren was confused, but Ioz became affright and instantly recognized it.

"Kutlack?! Noy jitat! By the twenty seas how did Bloth get Kutlack?!" Ioz petrified with awe, doing a doubletake to see if he had judged things correctly. "That jitatan bottle contains the most deadly poison on all of Mer!" He sounded as if he were having a stroke on the spot and he backed up haltingly, Tula had also been stunned and distraught beyond expectation.

"Do we really want to ask?" Niddler chimed in at Ioz's question.

"It's more lethal than what Ioz was hit with!" Tula calamitously trumpeted, clearly frantic as she flinched and jabbed backward with shock.

"Clam up, fools! It's only poisonous if it's swallowed!" Bloth bent around to them and gnarled with the dangerous substance in fist. He twisted a chilling stare at the titan. "This beast is going to do just that." He divulged a foul plan with a vile laugh. The AK crew gasped.

"No, Bloth! We don't need to kill it!" Ren fiercely screamed. "It just wants to get out of the dark water! We just need to get close enough! No!" Ren strained for the helm as the brute pushed him away. Finally, the warlord pinned a clawed hand over the boy's head and guided with the other while Ren cursed and thrashed his arms.

"No, boy! We're going to do this my way, I don't play nice like you! It's only too bad the beast and this magic bottle couldn't have gone to better use." Bloth laughed and scowled at the valiant lad who drudged to stop him, he drew eyes on his frontman and strategist. "Make way! Konk, Man the rig! Mantus, Aloft!" He ordered to his obliging subordinates.

"No!" Tula lunged for the curb of the vessel, she sought triumphantly to connect with the spell engraved into the boards. Unfortunately, in front of her trail approached a heinous Mantus. She was discarded like sour debris.

"Noy jitat! I never would've belie-Ren! Stay out of the way!" Ioz quickly thundered as he rushed Ren away from the hazard.

"But Ioz!" Ren rebelled as he flailed his feet at being dragged off.

"You don't want to know what I've been told about this." Ioz harshly forewarned and pulled Ren off. He restrained the young man by the arm, Ren stood back and watched.

"Yes master!" Konk groaned and hustled to do as told.

Mantus ran with and carried the cinched bag with the sealed vial of poison between his teeth as he tactfully shimmied up the mast and when he crawled to the top, he let the poison out and poured it in the bag. The leviathan had been caught between twin spires of stone, in pursuit of the ruby barge. It could move to snap at the schooner but could not bite it. The rocks would cave when it would eventually ram the way through, but the sea-serpent was weakened by the harnessing sludge. "Die beast!" The ex-commander snarled maliciously as the leviathan gaped it's mouth with the intent of eating him, he threw the ditty. He slid back down the post and the creature missed him. It swallowed the bag and withdrew. Then it fell, limp into the ruin below as some boulders from the peak slid from their surface to further bury the monster in the desecrated filth. Waves rolled when it sunk, the cutwater was briskly slicing away from the staggering current. The troop of the Wraith witnessed with glazed eyes, immobile at the disturbingly captivating aerial-spectacle of the leviathan that went under.

"Killing them is much better!" The large buccaneer rumbled, and the ship plowed to impending frontiers.

The sky began to darken ever foremost as the journey continued onward. The trifling clearing of blue salvation had at last come into view. The ship would need to temporarily break for the hope of any nourishment.

"Ioz, make sure that Treasure is where it's supposed to be!" Ren called out from the small pool of shivering cerulean, he focused his attention back to brushing the fishing net in his palms.

"You don't need to worry about that, Ren. I wouldn't lose sight of it for my life." Ioz staidly assured his station on the Wraith with a glittering crystal locked in his grip. He digressed merely to engage in a mutual glare with the rival to his right.

"That's good, Tula. Just a little more." Ren rippled his gold tail around to glance at his fellow shipmate, who he encouraged to bolster a sturdy handle on the snare. Tula's driving of the swimmers into the the mesh had been going smoothly until he noticed her spark sputtering out. "Don't use all your energy." The prince cautioned the mystic as two more fish joined the school, his eyes shifted to the ecomancer. He drifted behind gingerly in the waves and observed her reverting to a conventional energy plane.

"Don't go too close to the dark water, it's coming back!" Tula hurriedly signaled for her partner to flee. Ren alarmed with unwelcome surprise as he witnessed the vision to the rear, he flit away from the incoming dark water.

"You're going to lose it, idiot!" The caustic voice from the opposing side of the oasis ricocheted. Mantus's rickety teeth chattered as he spat at the incompetent helper.

"Slippery fish won't stay still! Konk got it, at last! Hahah!" Konk pompously grandstanded his victory over the slimy and wriggling fish he clapped in his oily mitts.

"Konk, give it to Mantus!" Bloth impatiently demanded as he banged a fist on the railing of the ship.

"Give it up, pig-face!" Mantus grunted in response with a glower to the overweight dunce. He emerged from underneath the arctic water and ripped the wooden utensil from his mouth, which contained one speared minnow.

"Me trying!" Konk bit back as he tried to annex the catch to hand it over but instead tossed it around. It contorted up and down and whirled out of his clutch.

"Ughh." The disgruntled bearded-oaf growled, he slapped a meaty palm against his forehead and Ioz returned a smug gleam. The atmosphere had not ceased to shade even heavier from any source of sun.

"Hey Ioz, isn't this weather kind of unusual?" Niddler dependably inquired as he softly pad up to the deep-toned man's posture with a incompletely scaled meal.

"It is, isn't it?" Ioz said in a matter-of-fact tonality as he glimpsed at the sky and then back at Niddler. He would need to prevent himself from going into hysteria then. "Chunga lunga!" He vivaciously bellowed. "Ren! Tula! Get up here, now!" He yelled a sign, watching his friends mount soon after with a sufficient haul. Ioz and the two exposed crew huddled at the bow, away from the enemy brigade. The dome of fog over the face of the sun would soon be fainter than any night. "Come here monkeybird, or you'll be in trouble." He commanded and allot no excuse.

"Right! I'm coming!" Niddler drastically screeched and beelined for his friends with what little sight circumstances would allow.

"Bloth thinks he can pull the sail over our eyes with the old Captain Kolumbaquest hoax, what manner of smool-brains does he take us for..." Ioz muttered a disappearing huff.

Ren welded firm to the group of companions at his standpoint, weapons all drawn in anticipation of any ill movement. Four colleagues transposed in the direction of the enemy camp. For an enduring time, they waited. The corona in the sky was everything but invisible and were it not for the Treasure of Rule Ioz carried with him, all would certainly be in mayhem. The greater of Mer's moons increasingly withdrew from the bludgeoned solardisc and the eclipse passed with nothing gone awry.

Sometime later when the stout vessel was making headway toward land, Ioz had regained the helm once more. The bright lad next to him was speaking.

"How much farther until land?" Ren asked Ioz, who was manifesting as much fatigue as he did.

"Not much, thank Kuunda." The weary navigator reacted somberly.

"Don't you want anything to eat, Ioz?" The worried Tula needled him.

"He poisoned a leviathan!" Ioz responded sharply. He did not wish to take the chance of his meal being laced with Kutlack.

"Ioz, you need to keep your strength up!" Tula relentlessly sassed, she perceived his physical weakness.

"He poisoned a leviathan!" Ioz repeated again to the ecomancer as if she was either insane or missed the very important point that couldn't be denied. No one argued with him on this. They walked down to the maindeck where Niddler and the rest settled. The crew was hungry and prepared to eat the fish they had captured earlier. Ren sat on a barrel, across from him reposed his worst foe in the twenty seas and two of his men.

"So, Son of Primus, how much longer until we come upon land?" Bloth diplomatically concerted, but Ren could see through his saccharine mask.

"Not long now." Ren delivered simply and coldly. He picked at the clean meat on his plate, eating before anyone else.

"Ahh. I can't wait to see land again, I've become so perturbed with all this...filth." The giant plunderer scanned about and smiled ruthlessly. Ren could be sure. The prince paused momentarily to make sure nothing had been stolen from him. The Compass was still around Ren's neck and the Treasure faintly glowed where it had been stowed, the map was still with him. The young man directed his gaze to the frail rogue next to his archnemesis, who only narrowed his icy glare when he saw himself being peered at, then to Niddler, who seemed to be having some kind of discussion with Konk.

Niddler was so hungry, he had not dined on anything substantial in days. His crew had been low on food to the point of borca-drippings. When he found out there was fresh fish available he did not jump for joy, but such pickings would be better than nothing at all. From the floor he nibbled on an uncleaned fish, making a meal when he heard Konk talking to him and he glanced up. "What do you want, piglet?" Niddler yapped with some irritation in his rebuff.

"Psst." Konk whispered to the monkeybird and pressed out a Puuka-Luuka pie on a plate in front of him. "Konk give monkeybird pie, if monkeybird get Bloth ale for Konk." The pegleg bartered, holding the tempting fare in front of the avian's face.

Niddler's eyes wandered but he knew he couldn't trust the short knave. "Thanks Konk, but I prefer my food not poisoned." Reluctant Niddler exonerated himself and gave Konk a firm eye of doubt, going back to eating his fish.

"Konk don't have poison, and why poison monkeybird when monkeybird can get ale?" Konk continued to prod him on.

Niddler swirled to the piglet, hands on his haunches and insulted. "I'm not your errand-monkeybird anymore, Konk! Those days went down with the ship I had them on!" Niddler indignantly squawked and fluttered his feathers in agitation at the pegleg who was making him edgy. Still, that pie looked good.

"Ok!" Konk yielded in agreement and then suspended his haggle. "Konk make that two!" With a sly grin, the piglet plunked another pie on the plate and offered it to the monkeybird. Niddler paused in ponder.

"Well, Prince Ren. I've happened to notice it is quite unusual that you are unarmed on your own ship, might I ask why?" Bloth interrogated the noble with the charm of a dartha-eel.

Ren was taken aback by this question, the 11th Treasure was still at Jenna's lighthouse after being reconstructed. Tula fiddled nervously next to him. His blue specks jostled downward at the barrel contiguous to the inquiring enemy of his, where a mug sat. Ren watched a monkeybird hand pick it up to siphon it, then replace it. He pretended not to notice. "That's not important." He at last lifelessly said. Ren prayed for Kuunda's reign to help him.

Bloth was beaming down chillingly at the blond hero when the driver at the helm hollered at last. "Land ho!" Ioz shouted the most jubilant announcement Ren envisioned he had ever heard from him. Ioz was aware of the plan to not go in too far to shore.

"Excellent! Mantus! Konk!" Konk was relinquishing a dish of pies when the devilish leader lifted him up and thundered for him to go. The monkeybird below with a full glass on the floor bickered impertinently.

"Hey! My pies!" Niddler squawked and yammered, complaining and scooting to chase after Konk. The plate dropped to the floor and he wavered about picking them up but then Ren ushered him.

"Niddler, come on!" Ren shooed the avian to the side of the ship, Tula followed after them.

The plan was carried out easier than expected, which the crew was glad for but at the same time they did not trust it. The three baleful ones were left on that island which though not completely desolate, was far out of the way. The mates of the rusty ship should have been safe. The fervid Treasure still resided in their dominion, and the Compass too. Ioz's world map was folded away. Everything was fine.

"Ay chunga am I glad that's over." Tula conveyed with bode relief. She wiped sweat from her brow as she toddled back from tossing overboard the remnants of the still-good but foreboding food supply of the Wraith.

"Right Tula, the plan worked." Ren acclaimed with an uneasy smile. His taut eyes tipped to the hovering island behind him once again.

"Chungo lungo, Ren. You don't know how badly I wanted to fight that jitatan sea-snake." Ioz vocalized in solace, his ire also withstanding.

"It would have gotten us killed." Ren flatly analyzed. "We need to continue to the next port." He embraced the Compass and exhibited his fascination, seeing that it retained in pointing toward the North. "There isn't much time left to find the 13th Treasure of Rule." Ren severely heralded as he scouted his surroundings, the sea and the skies were bleak and caliginous.

"We need to take a break soon, Ren. We're exhausted and our food supply is wasted thanks to Captain Scumbucket and his cronies. It's going to take a while before Bloth gets off the island, he doesn't have his Maelstrom anymore." Tula stated the obvious truth. All of them were beat, even Niddler and Ren himself.

"You're right." Ren promptly approved as he inspected the nautical chart. "There is a port here nearby, farther North so it has to be close to where the Compass points." He reported with clarity in his words. "We should be able to resupply there and rest." He tiredly imparted, rolling up and putting away the makeshift map. The others nodded in agreement.

"Ren, I still can't figure out what happened to all the minga-melons!" Niddler came out from the cavity beneath the floor and yakked. "We had so many and now they're all gone!" The flying flutter-of-feathers complained, he nuzzled his leader's hand. Ren just laughed.

"Actually...Mantus ate one of yours." Ren truthfully informed Niddler, a trace of seriousness airing.

For exactly one moment, Niddler was speechless. Then he quickened into a furious squawk. "I'll scratch his wilted-guuda head off!" Niddler sourly screeched and chattered, strikingly bitter.

"I didn't think those were edible unripe." Tula touched on a twinge of vagueness.

"We'll get you some more, Niddler. You should be lucky you didn't have any left, Bloth could have poisoned them." Ren succored with a reassuring word and the monkeybird felt an inkling better.

"I guess you're right." Niddler squawked and sat down to relax.

After the Wraith pulled away in the sea of obsidian, something hit the air that no one noticed. It flew toward the obscure island the ship had only just departed from.

On the minor landmass where the trio of reprobate looters had disembarked, ashen dagron-swarms circulated in the sky. The figures stood solemnly upon the blanketing shoreline.

"What we do now Bloth? There nothing here but wild dagrons! Not suitable for riding!" The short and peg-legged rascal shouted as a dagron swooped overhead and tried to raise him up. The stray met with a mauling sword, which flung in the direction of the beast and caused it to fly off.

"I'll tell you what we do now, Konk. Mantus?" Bloth addressed both his loyal minions with a crooked smile.

"Right here." The haggard swindler coldly sung, grinning cleverly as he handed over a glass shard to the hulking tyrant.

"Excellent job, Mantus. You've succeeded in reminding me of why I made you my commander. Your plans never cease to impress me, how lucky I am to have a swordsman who's both good with a sword and a bottle." Bloth praised the bladesman as he seized the transparent sliver that occurred to be a perfect replica of the 12th Treasure of Rule in his claws.

"It's easy, Milord, when we attack the most vulnerable member of their crew. Two smool-brains for the price of one, as if I would refuse a bet with Konk." Mantus smirked and puffed as he glared downward and pretentiously at the sloppy pirate below him, who returned a scowl. He flicked a minga-melon seed from his mantle as he choked once more. "Of course, Bloth, the rip-off would be enough, but Ren and his comrades have also abandoned the item they most need." He proudly displayed the stolen Guyfoo-capsule and it's guardian dinosaur. With a squeeze, the beast mutated into a black ocarina. The compartment inside the instrument allowed storage for an opened clam-shell.

"Once we plant this decoy, the boy will never know what hit him." Bloth chuckled of triumphant deceit as he ran a nail across the cut bottle. "First, we find our new bucket among the Boneyards of the abandoned Quin Mines." Under a composed aptitude he internally made provisions.

"But Sir, that most dangerous in twenty seas! There be bonadyctals and flying-skulls! Give me shivers just thinking about it..." Konk disputed with the utmost concern under his brow.

"Have you forgotten who you work for?" Bloth graciously compelled.

"Good point." Konk quelled.

"Now watch, Konk, Ioz will soon be Wrecked to assess my nautical status. See the Sun's Declination after the Time of Darkness, every forty-five fourfold years and two, will bring us..." With a demonstration, he raised his sword to reflect the Sun of the Northern skies, positioning it just-so at the umbra to reveal flecks of light from the Hopping Isles of the masked perspective. Konk's awed gape fixated at the glitter of turquoise and jade ore from a consecutive chain of invisible lands. The hue matched the neckline of the tallest of Bloth's henchmen. "Mer's most profound illusion, and...Our way out." The former King of the Waves spoke of certain confidence.

"But how we sail to Treasure when we don't have it?" Konk aired his puzzlement of this plan he was left out of. "We need dagron!" The chubby pirate related.

"No, we have something even better." The insidious villain growled with a creeping lip. "There!" The grandiose man pointed out in the air where a pair of wings were fluttering down upon the triad. The birdlike creature rested on Bloth's shoulder.

"The boy and his crew are headed for port to rest. They are down and they are weak, they will leave their ship close to shore and away from the dark water, so they will not realize the Treasure is missing until it is far, far, too late!" The bird began to summarize, snickering with a cunning cackle.

"Excellent." Bloth walloped a profound laugh. "Who knew the finest spy I ever did have would have wings, not a sword!" The insidious lord jested as he stroked the avian's feathers. He broke to replace Morpho's world map that he carted under his stocky arm.

"This is true." The sly bird-voice mused again. "And after I help you, I'll reign with more power on Mer than one monkeybird could imagine in a lifetime!" The evil monkeybird cruelly sniggered.

"Only the best, Yellow-Wing!" The savage pirate bellowed.

"It's too bad." Yellow-Wing tuned. "That featherbrain will never figure out who's been eating all of his minga-melons." Yellow-Wing laughed himself sick, he pulsed his violet and yellow feathers as he claimed the duplicate Treasure and lifted off into the grayed Merrian skies.


	14. The Spirit - The Curse

Chapter 13 EPIC ENDING PART 1

THE SPIRIT - THE CURSE

PART 1 DESIRE

Part ? Ransom of the Gold Daughter

Dark water filled the seas and the rivers, some of the beaches. Steadily, it took over, no longer having the boundaries of the Treasures of Rule scattered across Mer. The sky remained a continuous muddy-gray, the end would be nigh.

In a tower far from the Northernmost peak of Mer, a brunette girl hummed placidly.

"I hope Ren and Big Brother are meeting fortune, wherever they are." Solia witnessed the fog settle in a faultless halo over the lighthouse. The darkness overwhelmed in so much of a way, it suggested the shine of magic was wearing down. The backlash of foul brine shortened even the birthplace of the Treasures of Rule. So many plans were ruined. The princess beside joined her in visual pursuit of the endless distance, wishes spread farther than eyes could see.

The dual-colored monkeybird flew on buoyant wings, tracking the mark the ship had left in the water. Yellow-Wing stayed just far enough out of sightrange as he clipped the crystalline Decoy in his beak. He followed the trail through the skies until the Wraith had come to port, then he vigilantly and stealthily touched down behind the stern, being careful not to be spotted at the rear of the ship. The yellow and purple monkeybird ducked into a barrel, looking and listening.

"Ren, I'm so hungry I could eat a barrel of melon!" Niddler whined about the lack of food.

"We'll be there soon, Niddler." Ren bantered his usual exchange with the monkeybird.

"We wouldn't be hungry if that kreld-eater didn't force us to toss our food stock." Ioz testily groused as he ambulated about the squeaking wood.

"You're the one who didn't eat, Ioz." Tula reminded the man of his previous forfeit.

"By my sword I didn't. I'm not risking my neck." Ioz argued a necessary rationale.

"We're here anyway." Ren dourly sighed, discontented over the atmosphere of disharmony as he drove the caravan in to dock.

"Ren, we need to hit town and then we'll come back to rest." Tula stretched her arms and yawned sleepily. "You should take some downtime since you're staying back here, you need to be well rested-up to find the next Treasure." She sensibly advised the zealous prince at the wheel, who did not act like he wanted to relax anytime soon. Did not want to, but his body would disagree.

"Thanks for the concern but I'll be fine, Tula. Once we get the 13th Treasure, then I'll take a break. Everyone in Octopon is probably wondering about how far away we are from them, and how close we are to ending the Quest. We can't give up now." Ren forecast with a certain determination in his purport, he wanted to make sure nothing would go wrong. Despite, he was sleepy.

"We won't be long, there's not much on this little island anyway. I don't believe I'm back here, I've only seen Takrar-town once in my life." Ioz firmly judged, musing on the alien and yet familiar surroundings. Tula peeked at him peculiarly. "You haven't been here before?" He queried in something of disbelief.

"No, Ioz, is there any place you haven't been?" The ecomancer impugned him in a snide mood.

"I haven't been to the North Pole of Mer!" Ioz erupted in retort. The crew almost was as far North as they could be, they had been traveling in the direction continuously. Tula let it taper off.

"Ren, you need to get some sleep. Bloth won't be on us for a while, we're all worn out. Ioz and I will pick up some stock in town and then we'll be back. Niddler will watch the ship for us, right Niddler?" Tula crooned to the monkeybird.

"Of course Tula!" Niddler squawked cheerfully as the piceous-haired mystic petted his head.

"We definitely won't be staying long. Takrar-town is so small, it doesn't even have a gamehous-Unusual weather." Ioz commented casually, but then his gape turned to the frazil on the surface of the low tide. Tula poked him a brief brow after hearing Gamehouse mentioned. Ioz and Tula trotted down the ramp of the tied vessel into the quaint little-village.

Ren sustained at the helm, dazing out at the distance of obscurity. His worries would not subside. He contended to boost his eyes open but had been successively failing, he was more exhausted than he realized. Behind him on the deck, Yellow-Wing would have to wait a prolonged time before Ren's stubborn bravado was at last put to bed. Only then did Ren decide to get some shuteye himself. "Niddler, keep watch on the ship." The tired noble requested. "I'm going to lay down, wake me up if anything happens." He listlessly directed to the monkeybird, who was lounging on the deck and purely watching the piddling section of sapphire waves crash against the hull below.

"Got it, Ren!" Niddler chirped back, peeking his head to the young man who retired to take a snooze. He carried on his lacuna, waiting for the ebb.

Ren straggled into the cabin behind and underneath, he spread out on the bed. His head crashed as it contacted the sheets, only a few moments had it taken before he was out completely. Being too worn-out, he did not notice the ruffle of yellow feathers that slipped in before he cracked the door closed.

Yellow-Wing abode until Ren was sound asleep. Clutched tightly in the aristocrat's hand was the small satchel containing the 12th Treasure of Rule. When Yellow-Wing was sure he could hearken the notes of snoring, he tiptoed on sneaky monkeybird-feet to the edge of the bed and nuzzled his head under the boy's open palm that had been hanging off into the air.

"Not now, Niddler..." Ren's sky-colored eyes fluttered but for a weary moment in the dim cabin, catching sight of a grinning monkeybird nudging him. "I'll find you something to eat in the morning." The lad drowsily yawned and shut his lids, then made to roll over.  
This was the solitary distraction that Yellow-Wing needed to pluck the pouch from the adolescent's hand and replace the phony Treasure he imported from inside his beak with the authentic. He bagged the fake and tucked it under Ren's twitching arm. On toes like breeze, he crept out of the straw crib and back onto the deck, that nosy monkeybird was distracting himself with verbal complaints.

"Why aren't there anymore minga-melons? I didn't go through them that fast..." Niddler grumbled as he ranted to himself. "Everyone thinks I just want to eat more than anything else. Ioz doesn't think I'm smart, well I'll show him...someday!" Niddler continued to whine and vent to himself all about unimportant but otherwise self-conceived notions. He sat with his hands on his haunches and pouted out to the open sea. The frontiers stayed calm for as long as he looked beyond, the calmest dark water could be, anyway. When he heard a noise he suspiciously raised an eyebrow, whipping around to procure a flash of something colorful disappearing behind the structure of the cabin. Niddler had tolerated enough of this, something was going on. He swooped up in back of the lodging and stationed on the stern, he shot his head in all directions. He did not see the yellow and lilac enemy until he stuck his head a little too close to a stow barrel, which then toppled over. To Niddler's woeful plague, he witnessed the Treasure fixed in the mandible of the traitorous monkeybird. "Yellow-Wing!" Niddler blurted with aghast and dumbfounded shock. "You! It's You who has been eating all my minga-melons!" He shouted with contempt, but his cognition set on something else as he backed away. "You're the one who lodged the Treasure of Rule in the floorboards so we would sink in the dark water! You tried to kill all of us!" Niddler horrendously yelped as he was about to turn tail to rouse Ren but it had been too late, Yellow-Wing snagged him by the tail.

"Very good, feather-head. For once you're using your brain, not your beak!" Yellow-Wing's charming inflection cruelly rendered a fleer as he now held the confiscated Treasure in an opposable foot. "Unfortunately for you, Puuka-Breath, you know too much so those words will be your last!" Yellow-Wing whispered maliciously, winding the long and furry hilt of the feathered looter's tailing posterior to his sabotage.

"Renn! Ren!" Niddler wrangled to tattle but his mouth was covered by an alien hand clasped over his face. He defied with flapping wings.

Inside the cabin, Ren's ice eyes flared open. He imagined a sense of something wrong but then he drifted back to sleep, much too drained to awaken.

Yellow-Wing crowed heinously. "Sorry feather-head, but you won't be getting away this time. There can be only one able-bodied monkeybird on this ship and his wings aren't a mottled red!" Yellow-Wing contested as he gripped a length of halyard rope in his paws and he jumped upon Niddler's back, pinning him to the floor. He then tied him up with the excess cordage. Binding his wings, he pulled the noose tight. Niddler could barely move, but he bit on Yellow-Wing's hand while it floated around his mouth, causing the aggressive monkeybird to yap.

"You traitor! How could you go against your own kind!" Niddler verbally fought, disgusted and enraged by the feathered-bully. Yellow-Wing jeered viciously as he stuck a segment of the rope between Niddler's open mouth, pulling it tight like a bit. To the pitiful horror of the scarlet monkeybird, all he could then do was make throaty squawks which were not nearly loud enough to call out.

"The wings of the feeble-minded crash under those who know how to succeed!" The wicked monkeybird cackled sinfully as he ferried Niddler into the air. "Not that it matters, once I deliver this present to Bloth, I'll have no need to return to your mangy ship." Yellow-Wing brashly professed as he tossed the beaten monkeybird into waves of the sea below. "You should be fortunate I'm letting you meet your end in water that is blue, it is remarkably hard to come by these days!" Yellow-Wing waded in the air, cawing below as the struggling Niddler glowered up at him from the tide with a helpless detest. "Consider it a gesture of gratitude, and a Tribute to our People!" He abominably snickered, but with the crane of his yellow neck saw two of the crew's shipmates walking from town back to their boat. "It's time for me to go, feather-lip. So long!" The conniving monkeybird fronted a sinister grin as he squawked his farewell and flapped off with the Treasure in foot. He disappeared into the great distance before Tula and Ioz continued to casually prance back to the ship. Niddler writhed in the water, scantly mustering to let out a muffled cry. He felt himself starting to choke on the water that he was barely keeping afloat in.

Ren opened his eyes. He perceived something, something was wrong. This time he did not fall back asleep, he got up and ran out to the deck to see if everything was okay. To his dismay, he did not see his avian friend anywhere. "Niddler!" Ren called out. "Niddler, where are you?" The long-haired protector outcried in a voice filling with alarm. He snapped his head in all ways. The captain of the Wraith stilled at a noise coming from off starboard-quarter that sounded like a muffled imitation of his name. He launched in the direction it rattled from. With panic, he saw his pal, Niddler, bound and gagged as well as about to drown in the water! "Niddler! Noy jitat!" Without anymore hesitation, Ren excitedly dove in after his distressed best-buddy and tried to pull him out of the choking spritz. He hearkened of speech coming up on the platform, magnifying to where the both of them were. Fortune managed to smile when the remainder of his brigade had been gone an unusually short time. "Ioz! Tula! I need a hand on deck!" Ren signaled from submergence as he labored to fight his way back to the floor of the ship, hauling the tied monkeybird in arm. The bobbed pirate and the ecomancer rushed to the bastion of the ship, following his scream.

"Ren?!" Ioz hollered with profound befuddlement. He noticed the blond savior and the monkeybird in the deluge. "Hold on, friend!" Ioz hurried and swung down a rope from the deck, which Ren latched onto and he and Tula lifted the prince and the passenger up and over the railing. With stunned eyes Ren knelt with his palms balled over his knees, he heaved to catch a breather. Tula carved at Niddler's bonds, slashing them away with her knife.

"Niddler, what on Mer happened?" Tula sought with intense concern in her easement as the monkeybird leapt forward to hug her. Then he quickly backed up to shout the entire story all out at once through weighty breath.

"Tula! Yellow-Wing was on the ship! He's employed by Bloth and he was spying on us! He stole the Treasure from Ren's pouch and I tried to stop him but he tied me up and got away!" Niddler screeched out his words in a brisk explanation and ran alltogether. Tula would have to reflect on his phrasing before she realized what he said.

"What?!" Ioz stammered with disbelief. Ren appeared stunned by Niddler's tale as well. "Bloth is using jitatan monkeybirds to steal from us?!" Ioz verbalized with utter bewilderment, not believing the apparent true testimony he was hearing. "Chungo lungo..." He cursed under his breath.

Ren peered into his rucksack and saw that the Treasure indeed seemed to be there but upon closer inspection, he realized it did not glow. The Compass from around his neck was also missing. Niddler's story checked out.

"He was spying on us the whole time! He was the one eating all my minga-melons! He tried to sink us by hiding the Treasure in the floorboards when the Maelstrom bumped the Wraith into dark water so we couldn't get ourselves out! He tried to drown me when I saw him make off with the Treasure! Now that kreld-pango-crunching minga-napper is going to take it to squid-lips!" Niddler described the entire disaster, hardly keeping pace enough for the others to read him. The crew tried to take all of this in.

"Jitatan monkeybirds!" Ioz grunted moreover. He was clearly astounded, but not in the best of manners.

"Hey!" Niddler was dissented by his choice of censure, insulted by the insensitive sailor. Ioz had talked as if allying with someone from his species was a desperate last-resort or some violation of rules of combat, which for Bloth, there were none.

"Calm down, Niddler. Just tell us what happened." Ren torpidly consoled, stroking Niddler's head as he shot a stare at Ioz. To him, it would make sense to use a monkeybird. They were smaller in size, and not easily detected. He knew Niddler had helped the rest of them out of a tough spot many a time, the fact Yellow-Wing could be doing the same for his archrival made him sick. Niddler slowed down and detailed everything, the dark water and the stealing of the jewel. The missing minga-melons, and all the times when he had seen suspicious movements or heard erratic noises but shrugged it off.

Ren stood up with eyes leveled downward as if he did not know what to think. Yellow-Wing somehow found Bloth. The estranged monkeybird had located their ship, he wondered how. Then he remembered, Pandaawa. That trap. "He couldn't have gotten far." Ren stated with a definitive affirmation. "Niddler said that Yellow-Wing had only just flown away when I found him in the water, which means he's already on his way back to the island." He desolately inferred.

"So, what? We take him down, right?" Ioz hastily rushed, questioning what to do next and what the prince's plan could be.

"No, this is a problem! We can't get through the dark water without the Treasure! Bloth has us cornered! It was a set-up, and Guyfoo is gone too..." Tula revealed the bad news. The crewmates pondered this quandary for a while in stillness.

"I might be able to take Yellow-Wing at best but I can't take Bloth and his entire crew...not even if I carried someone, and I'm so hungry that I'm not sure if I can still fly the distance back to where we were." Niddler offered timidly, after a long hiatus. Silence again fell.

"No, Niddler." Ren's somber and direful voice averred at last. The others heeded in reverence of what he was about to say then.

"Ren?" Tula cautiously bespoke him.

"We'll go toward the 13th Treasure of Rule, that's where he will be headed. I have an idea where it is anyway. If we go back now, we'll just miss him on the way there. That is what he'll be expecting." Ren said with solidity. Everyone else fearfully attended to him.

"But Ren, Bloth has the Compass and the 12th Treasure!" Ioz blustered at him. "If you go to the 13th Treasure, you're certain to meet him there!" With trepidation he disputed, undeniably aghast at the idea.

"I don't have a choice, Ioz. The fact that he's going there is all the more reason why I need to get there first and claim the Treasure before he does, and he already has a head start. After I get the Treasure then I don't know, but I'll think of something." Ren certified his input, but the crew was floored by the suggestion.

"Ren, we won't be able to go with you, he's too dangerous to fight alone! Besides, how will you know where you're going if you don't have the Compass?" Tula contrived with dreading opposition. "If Niddler is even in any shape to fly you there, you could both go down if he loses his strength and then we won't be able to rescue you..." She sensitively browsed upon the winged ally, who was clutching his gut.

"Because, Tula. I already know where it is. It's at the North Pole of Mer, it's the only place that makes any sense being as far North as we are. I guess I haven't thought about all the problems though..." The flaxen fellow disclosed with an uneasy enlightenment. He also remembered seeing it as one of the places marked on Bloth's map, he knew that would have to be where it was.

"Ren, this is too dangerous..." The ecomancer warned him, emotion stayed unambiguous in her expression. She feared he had already made up his mind. Niddler peeked at Ren with anxiety, no one had asked his opinion on this but he knew he would have to take Ren wherever the prince wished to go. The monkeybird squawked sedately.

"Wait, Ren." Ioz spoke up. "There is another way. No one has to go down in dark water and Niddler doesn't need to fly into oblivion, provided he can keep a good balance." It was sudden when Ioz relented, his tune reformed from absolute terror to one of planning. He scaled the broken beam of the sail, inspecting the glider and noting to secure some parts. He spun a pensive eye to Tula from above, meeting her renewed expression. "I'll need your help here, woman, we need to get this ship-shape before the polar winds go awry with the tide. That spare jib will make a good replacement tail for two, now let's move." Ioz didn't waste any time with niceties, but for once Tula was not sore with the benevolent scalawag. "Ren and Niddler should have about three moonrises as long as the airflow stabilizes. Niddler, of course will have to assume the rudder." He cloaked a certain type of throe hindering his vision as he uttered those stern words. Tula rebounded to forage through a cache of supplies and then after making some adjustments, joined the journeying pair on the base.

"Once we get the Treasure we'll come back here, that's a promise. I know this is what I have to do. For the sake of my Father. For Octopon, and everyone." Ren glimpsed down and then back up at Tula with a serious focus in his pale pools, words made course. His dedicated companions were forced to relent at the point of Bloth already traversing a way there. If the evil Pirate Lord gained the 13th Treasure before they did, it really would be all over.

"Ren." Ioz invited under a hardened will, steadily and firm. "Take this." Ioz signaled as he handed Ren his sword. "I don't know how much help it will be to you but if you're going to take on that dartha-eel alone, you're going to need something to protect yourself with. This is my part in the Quest." Ioz denoted of permanency and placed his hand on the boy's shoulder, steeling his sable and protective eyes. Ren hesitantly sealed the blade.

"He won't be alone, he'll be with me!" Niddler loyally squawked, proud and brave as he compelled the greatest display of courage since he had reassigned himself to the Quest. He posed steadfastly by Ren's side with a whole wingspan. Before he could say anything else, he saw Tula motioning to him.

"This is for you, Niddler." Tula established as she supplied him her cutlass. "It shouldn't be too much extra weight." The strong-hearted empath assayed, and Niddler nodded with concordance.

"Tula, Ioz. Thank you." Ren blessed his companions, his stalwart spirit switching ahead as he hugged them both tightly. "Tula." He said the woman's name and she gazed at him, he leaned forward and performed the one thing he had perpetually desired to. She gleamed as he broke off from her lip and it did not feel unusual, but very natural. Niddler, by his side, delivered final goodbyes. "Let's go Niddler!" The golden-haired boy shouted as he preempted the position to fly with the ruby-colored monkeybird off into the limitless unknown. Ioz pulled the lever.

"Farewell Ren! Stay brave! You too, Niddler!" Tula bid the airborne youth and avian farewell from the ground. She imbued sonorous sadness and worry, but she withheld as to not let her emotions take her over. Still, her vision clouded. She saw the pair fork a direction in flight, possibly to smile back and then they evaporated into the horizon. She turned to Ioz. "Do you think it was a good idea to hand over our weapons?" For once, she was unsure as she asked him.

Ioz recessed his palm from it's determined formation, the same pose painted on the Wraith's jolly roger. "We needed to, Tula. It's not our own lives we have to be worried about. It's Ren who Bloth is after, this is Ren's Quest. There's nothing we can do now. Always Ren's Quest." Ioz solemnly worded, his expression stony. "We should see if the only room in town is still for three coins' rent." Tula wordlessly granted her compliance and aimed to wipe the saltwater from the calcified pioneer's cheekbone, but she instead pecked it away. He blinked a stain from his sightline and laid a strong arm around Tula for comfort, he felt torn as he saw the duo fade into the murky gray.

It took a long time before a brightly-colored monkeybird and a carried man-passenger reached the seaside of a measly land just South of the legendary North Pole of Mer. The island was almost desolate, but tropical. It actually occurred to have varying weather conditions. There was no snow on Mer, except on high-mountain peaks, but parts of this island could have come close to having real snow on the ground. There was a dormant volcano, which could be seen mounted in the center of the land. The monkeybird dumped the prince on the sandy shore below and briskly fell out of the air. The fallen aircraft ate green.

"This Treasure better not be very heavy! I'm going to die if I have to do that again...all I could think of on the way here was being wrapped in dark water!" Niddler complained as he crashed down on the beach. "I have wing-cramp!" The pitiful primate-bird whined. Ren was holding the two weapons on him.

"Patience Niddler, we're going to need all our strength for this!" Ren hyped with valor as he ascended upward from a tumbling fall. He held Ioz's heavy sword at-the-ready while on one knee and tossed Tula's cutlass to Niddler. "At least our ride sustained itself well-enough." He assessed with a pry to the treetops.

Niddler caught the weapon with a chatter and scurried after Ren, wielding it with one of his arms. "Do you even know where this Treasure might be?" The avian whimpered.

"We'll just find out where it is!" Ren exerted his ambition as he started breaking for jungle and slashing down at brush that stood in the way. Perhaps due to the unpredictable landscape or the constant dusk, he tripped. "Ok, maybe for now, we rest. It's almost downtime, so help me find some twigs to set up camp." His stamina declined, to Niddler's charmed fortune.

"Ren, let's camp...but maybe somewhere we don't have to find out what that creepy light in the sky is!" Niddler abruptly spooked, unaware of the abstruse blinking and flashes of the tropospheric zenith on count of their arrival.

"It must be the legendary Polar Star. It's a different Mer this far North. I've never seen any place like here." Ren examined the spectacle of a green luminary almost large as the sun but only casting enough glow as the largest moon. The night was in a perpetual state of half-light.

"It's giving me the willies!" Niddler drew shivers. He crossed his cowardly arms whilst passing lively dinosaurs as they roared and scattered dagron bones. Gloss from the stellar dome tinged off the golden pyramids fronting the highland flora.

"We shouldn't light a fire until we eat but..." He impeded his sentence, a nippy gust zipped past and caused a shiver. He drove his interest of the frazil-covered waters near to the sandbar. Ren hugged his midsection and when warmth resumed, he busied himself with inspecting for suitable trees. They settled to cross only a trifling portion of the region, and would set out first thing tomorrow. Ren lay by the monkeybird as he gaze up at the twinkling smears of the rainbow stars.

The following illusion of dawn, two unset moons levitated in the atmosphere. The monkeybird stretched stiff and agonizing muscles. The teen gathered goods in a rucksack for the upcoming expedition.

"Time to start a new night, I guess." Niddler made a yaping yawn after Ren arose to blow out the fire. After scrutinizing the misty twilight, he bumbled about behind his leader. "I hope Bloth doesn't show up!" Niddler fussed until he saw something that delighted his eye. He peeked up in bliss as he saw the tree. He stared with boundless hankering, anticipating the momentous occasion when all his agony would be quelled by that one long-awaited sensation. His beak began to dribble with rapture, he smacked his salivating tongue. "Minga-melons!" He gleefully bayed out as he managed to find some strength left in his feeble feathers to hover up and grab a succulent fruit from the minga-tree. He fluttered down to Ren and began loudly munching as he pad. It was the most delicious minga-melon he ever tasted.

Ren crept and slunk around the vicinity. He heeded a noise he imagined he heard, and ducked behind a bush. Niddler started whining again so he needed to clamp a hand over the beak and pull him somewhere secure. From the corner of his eye, he spied a gleaming aurora in the distance. "Look, Niddler!" Ren called to the monkeybird-friend. "That must be it!" In a whisper, he alerted his pal from nearby. Ren split for the path by which the light shone and learned that before him loomed a prodigious tunnel with a low ceiling, one which seemed to be partially submersed in water. To his misfortune, he also saw that it was moderately dabbled with dark water. The deadly mud was even starting to make route in to inland streams.

"Oh great, what now!" Niddler outcried with a halfeaten melon-rind in hand.

"Come on!" Ren hushed him, dragging him through the wild by a primate arm. There were sparse spots in the enclosure where rocks protruded outward in a ledge which could be jumped on. Niddler detached from Ren to not risk knocking the royalty off his balance. Ren leapt in a broad stride and a tendril of goaded ooze lashed at his leg. "Noy jitat!" Ren cursed with terror. He had surpassed the length to the otherside, although his frightened look of cerulean focused on the water.

"That was so close!" Niddler meekly squawked, he hovered to Ren and hid himself under feathered wings.

Ren and Niddler dashed out of the cave and ended up on a grassy knoll. "That's strange." Ren straightly commented. He meandered onward when something impelled him to draw the sword he lugged in his palms, it was a korb! "Niddler! Help me fend it off!" He conjured to his companion, who was now sweeping down with the auxiliary weapon as well. The korb shed the flying-friend with a little more than a hassle and plucked up Ren, speeding away with him. "Let me go! Jitatan, kreld-face!" Ren battled to tear away from the solid monster's grip, but could not manage to free himself. He whirled the plenteous sword at the beast and it assumed no effect.

"Hold on, Ren! I'll save you!" Niddler called out from afar. He flit in to distract the barbarian and it swung at him, trying to fling him away.

"Ugh!" Ren yelped. He was pounding his fists on the beast with ire, his expression maintained one of dire fury. He felt it drop him to the ground and he landed on his back. He sat to face up and watched the beige armor run into the immediate forest. He stared for a moment and then rose to walk off. "That's over, I guess." The blond explorer guilelessly estimated as he dusted himself off and tread toward the glow, which he found he was nearer to. He hobbled down the hill where he had been planted, the slope pushing him to accelerate. "Come on, Niddler, it's not much farther!" Exuberantly, he urged the monkeybird on. His face displayed a teeming exhilaration as he caromed down the turfy hillside with airborne feet. He then tumbled, hitting the ground. He found himself rolling sideways and plummeting. Right down to a field of lava and a molten cavern below. Hurried daunt flew in his eyes and he screamed.

"Look out! I've got you!" Niddler squealed out with a scare as he charged to keep the prince from falling into anguish below. Unfortunately, he missed and Ren had been stuck floundering for a protruding stake upon the melting walls that slid open like a zipper. He had been falling away with the tar and boiling rock. Ren tiredly gawked at the monkeybird who scooped him up and dropped him over to the other side, atop a ledge. The majestic adventurer regained his stamina and moved forward. The drabulin tint continued to brighten, surrounding a vermilion aura.

"Phew!" Niddler burdensomely sighed, exhausted and feeling the ache under the scapula. "Can we please take a break?" The monkeybird pleaded but as he did, the two heroes found themselves plunging into a square-shaped hole which was fixed as a trap. Below were dangerous spikes.

"What was that about a break, Niddler?" The athletic boy inquired with a dry wit. "Arrgh!" Ren wailed when he spotted something lunging for his leg. His chest pounded when he set eyes on the vicious and voluminous two-toned snake nipping for his heel. He was hanging onto a ledge of the trap, not far from the top so he kicked into the wall in front of him and with a grunt, mustered to use his gymnastic strength to swing himself to the top and away from the red and black viper. He captured his breath and viewed the Treasure within range, Niddler patted down close to him. "There it is, Niddler!" Ren pointed out to the twinkling jewel in front of them.

"Finally! Now we can go back!" Niddler tranquilly squawked. He whined as he dashed toward Ren when the springy man had gotten too far ahead.

"Wait, Niddler. There's something here." Ren wrought a notion. Quizzically, he stretched out a hand that touched upon a shiny gem, which instantaneously ceased to emanate when it had been dispelled from the previous location. The regent further inspected the item and learned the supposed Treasure merely reflected another sparkling beam, one with even more luminosity. Ren shook a different article. "This is..." He diligently began his diction of the words on the paper sign rooted alongside the mirror. "Not the Treasure..." He continued to squint and read the scrawled print. "You were hoping for. Follow the path of white if you wish to know of The Chronicles of Octopon and The Surge." He purposefully finished the note with a diacritic reminiscence. "That's odd." Ren outwardly gestured. "You know what this means, right Niddler?" He queried of his travelmate.

"Bloth has beat us here?" Niddler logically made a shot in the dark.

"No, Bloth wouldn't leave messages for us, Niddler." Ren peered at his friend with felicity, he laughed at the silly monkeybird and folded out the map of Arakna. "If he did, he would have taken the Treasure for himself. Well actually, hm. That is a good point, but this note appears to be marked in a way similar to the Arakna map given to me by Loren...and actually, there's part of a map here, but I can't see what it's supposed to depict. Sleapat wilakli, Tikla Ren. Mak menkiy Teyuat Nikotarems! Tukla Toii. KarrKarrKarrKarrKarr!" Ren flipped the odd document over and recited the alien jargon. "Loren and Avagon said father's notes were often written this way to conceal secrets yet to be deciphered and this language matches perfectly! I see something glowing over there. This can only mean there's a beneficent aide on the island, someone who might be able to help us and tell us more. Maybe Avagon is here, how else could they know where it would be? See? This mirror stone doesn't glow, they must know and this must be some trick to elude Bloth! I guess we have to go where it says, but we won't follow the trail unless we're sure we can get back to our rendezvous. The Surge...hmm." Ren insistently set on doing as the note said to, quick in his enthusiasm. He followed the ray of light to where the Treasure promised to present itself, but he pondered the final two words.

"Shouldn't we make some kind of backup plan? Ren...I don't think..." Niddler reluctantly pedaled, cloaking doubts within. "Wait!" He screeched while he pattering off after Ren. His mind twisted on to something else. Something evoked worry from him. "Wait, Ren! Stop! Wait!" Niddler called out and fought to seize his breath, Ren inclined to him with puzzlement.

"What is it, Niddler?" Ren questioned his red-feathered friend. "We're almost there." He was duly sharp with his broadcast. He didn't have time to be playing reassure-the-monkeybird.

"When you get the Treasure...we probably should go our separate ways." Niddler yawped with sadness, Ren now solely imparted his attention on his audibly upset partner.

"What Niddler? Why?" Ren immersed in confusion over his friend's sorrow that came from nowhere. He delicately leaned down to the monkeybird, his skylit eyes aimed at his companion with concern.

"I'm no better than Yellow-Wing!" Niddler dejectedly cried out.

"Niddler, what do you mean by that? You didn't betray or steal from us..." Ren murmured as if he was floored by Niddler's sudden and ineffectual demeanor.

"I did Ren...but it was before I met you." With difficulty Niddler whimpered out his words. He desisted weakly, waiting for the right thing to say about what had been eating him up inside. "I was the spy for Bloth that doomed your family. I helped him identify where they were when he attacked, I was the monkeybird who delivered the fake invitation letter from King Primus to Phorlock and your relatives for the Moonsail festival! King Primus had lost his mind after he was captured, so instead Mantus forced Kayra to forge his signature!" Niddler uncomfortably admitted all at rapid pace from his beak.

"You told him where the Palace of Scholars was, and who is Kayra?" Ren's eyes dithered, he staggered on a swelling of issues.

"No! I accidentally retrieved a flier signed by King Primus on my scouting mission and it gave Bloth the idea to ambush. Kayra was umm...Mantus's pawn. I don't know her name, I just heard Ioz call her that because I knew Ioz too...I didn't want to say anything. Ever since I could fly, Bloth made me do tasks for him. I didn't know what it was about, I just did it. I helped destroy Octopon. I didn't say anything because I knew Ioz and Tula would hate me. I'm sure you do now too..." Niddler dolefully squeaked and slumped his head down with guilt and shame, not wanting to meet his pained friend's gaze. Silence perpetuated for a long moment of time. The memory in the monkeybird's mind would be as clear as fogless morning.

Niddler recalled his memory to five years after the first attack on Octopon's shores. He remembered a hungry monkeybird-fledgling perched on the floorboards of the ship formerly part of a leviathan. Nine-year-old Niddler was brought up from the sewers below. He was told to scour the city the ship had docked by, at a promise of table scraps. Young Niddler squawked and took flight, in fear of the man's lethal threat. The malnourished hybrid also yearned to sate his hunger, he had not grown as tall as the other monkeybirds he had seen. He soared upon the Crystal City where he observed a girl and an older boy with two adults, they seemed troubled over a third, who had not shown up. Niddler flew back to the dysfunctional place of his upbringing with the news. Before he had been tossed his reward, the fat runt tried to steal it from him for no reason other than to torment.

On the island, Ren attended to his sorrowed friend, not knowing entirely what to say. He sympathetically noted the pain in the avian's shuddered form, of whom was meeting the dirt with a stare. "Ioz and Tula wouldn't hate you, Niddler." Seriousness in his inflection, the young searcher approached the glum buddy at last. "How old are monkeybirds when they can fly?" He requested him with a thought, Niddler was surprised by the interest and shot a head up.

"Seven." The still-unsettled Niddler shrilled in surprise as his eyes bulged at Ren, who seemed to be lost in personal devices.

Ren perpended a consideration. "How old were you when you were sold?" Ren challenged his maroon buddy with all seriousness a second time, greeting with flinty eyes.

"Seven!" Niddler exclaimed this time, caught quite off-guard. To his stutter, the austere prince lodged a hand on his shoulder. "Just accept it, Ren. I'm a bad monkeybird..." He muttered over a stolid significance, his viridian bird-eyes welled with emotion again. Niddler was heartbroken, and for good reason. Ren was the only person besides Tula who treated him with respect as a travelmate even with his, at times, pathetic whining. Ioz's heart was there for him but Niddler had always bothered the ordinary rogue. Mantus had once tried to snap his neck, and Konk always delighted in torturing him at every turn.

"Did you ever obey Bloth for any reason save for food or safety?" Ren sternly studied, to Niddler's wonder.

Niddler edged on a pause, he would have to think about this. "Well..." The monkeybird teetered. "No. Well, there was that one time I tossed Konk overboard after he stole something and blamed me, but it was a situation where neither of us would confess...so I..." Niddler yammered drastically, believing he had reported something horrible. He then droned on and tweaked a finger to his chin as he became lost in musing. "Actually...maybe, maybe Strand did it instead..." He started to phase out in his own memory, rambling to himself. Ren did something unexpected.

"Niddler." Ren said again, firm as he could be. His hand still laid on the monkeybird's shoulder when Niddler's emerald purview regarded him. "Then I don't accept it." He gestured the monkeybird a sly smile and confab. "Last one to the Treasure eats borca-paste!" He readily exhorted. Ren pushed the monkeybird over on his back and then got up and walked away as if nothing happened.

"Hey!" Niddler warbled aloud, startled as he watched as Ren continued to stroll toward the Treasure. He was very stunned by that reaction. Did this mean Ren forgave him? Distance between himself and his confidant was growing. "Ren, hold on! Wait for me!" Niddler squawked disorderly, flustered as he picked himself off the ground and skimmed to catch up with the light-haired majesty.

"We're finally ready to return to everyone and find out how the Treasures can help us!" Ren welcomed the monkeybird with a boyish laugh as he swung him around by the mitts in celebration. He then approached a stone altar in the dense jungle that was sitting away from everything else. He observed some opaque and sealing sediment. The golden Treasure was fastened inside. He searched around for a hard material he could use to break through, but his eyes met on nothing. "Well Niddler." He began and lifted Ioz's borrowed sword. "I can't ask for permission, so I'll ask Ioz for forgiveness later." He grunted as he swung the blade at the obstruction, which would dull it. It had taken many attempts but eventually, the thin encasing broke and revealed the shimmering Treasure of Rule and a divine glory within. He leaned in closer to the magical gem. With inspection, he saw that it was an ample ring with an impression in the center. "Isn't it amazing?" Ren asked the companion beside him. The two of them were in a wide stretch of space with nothing abound except for the neighboring wilderness, but the tropics diminished in one direction. "This is the last Treasure of Rule! Now we can really save Mer and everything on it from the scourge of the dark water!" Ren surely rejoiced. Ecstatic with a wondrous affinity, his hands tapped the Treasure. After, was when a sight bedazzled before his eyes. He and Niddler were now stuck inside a cylindrical enclosure.

"What now?" Niddler whimpered, he swooped around the barren wall of white that had solidified out of the abyss.

"Chungo lungo! Amazing!" Ren awed as he beheld the interior. Something emerged in the middle of the circle. Doppelgangers appeared before the witness of the man and the monkeybird.

"Greetings. We are the twins, Sura and Hura. We are the embodiment of the Treasure of Rule you seek." The duo heralded in synchronic introduction and bowed formally. Upon closer observation, it became perceptible that the azure-eyed clones were joined at the hand and foot on one side.

"The Treasure of Rule, really?" Niddler squawked, excited and not believing his feathers. Ren tried to make himself known in this moment but the new arrivals proceeded with activity.

"I am Sura, I am the Mind of the Treasure of Rule." Sura's collected laud called throughout.

"I am Hura, I am the Force of the Treasure of Rule." Hura's boisterous hail shattered all around.

"You must defeat us. You will obtain our abilities in the time you are with us, which your spirit will receive, but there is more to harnessing our potential. If you defeat us, you will gain our power. If we defeat you, we will find a more worthy master." Both twins recited at once and before Ren could do any more, he found himself straining to flee from Hura, who was swishing at him and roaring. The doubles pivoted in a continuous revolve from the core of the tubular room. Hura lashed out in front while Sura guarded the rear. Ren found himself flying as fast as he could in a spin, almost becoming entangled in the identical whiplash of gilded hair.

"Ren!" Niddler cawed from up above, his monkeybird hands suctioned to the ceiling of the spacey tube. "Can I do anything?" He imposed timidly, his counterpart had not motioned for him to do anything at all.

"Actually, Niddler." Ren returned as he ducked under the rotating Hura, and then Sura. "It feels like this Treasure can help me somehow, I just don't know how yet." He speculated as he lunged at Hura head-on and fell to the ground. "That's it, Niddler!" He loudly proclaimed. Niddler flew down to try to jar the duplicates from spinning, but became subdued instantly.

Ren waited for Hura to slice around again and dodged his blows, he watched Sura coming next. "It seems wrong to attack you personally, Sura, especially when you're not attacking me at all. At least not visibly." Ren emboldened and swung the Mind of the Treasure of Rule out of orbit and the twirling ceased. Hura careened off-course and struck at Ren, clutching his leg. "And you, Hura, you didn't notice my other hand was free!" Ren playfully quipped and hit the Force of the Treasure of Rule straight on, causing both to fall away.

"That was interesting, Sura must have been controlling the motion, and Hura was the strength behind it." Niddler commented from his observant perspective. The rink and the twins disappeared and Ren and Niddler were restored to the island.

"Congratulations, Shinning One. The Treasure and our power, belong to you." The voices faded away and the Treasure on the altar materialized into view.

Ren carefully unmounted the Treasure from it's place on the chantry and the stone shifted back. Admiring it, he noted that the brim was wide enough to fashion around his head, a perfect fit actually. He casually lifted the Treasure off his dome and ferried it with his left arm.

"I knew the Treasure was going to be heavy!" Niddler expectantly complained. "Let's get out of here before Bloth decides he'd rather carry it instead!" The feathered-friend tugged on Ren's arm, wanting to go. He had just jumped away as arrows shot, flying at him. He was not fast enough and found himself trapped under a wooden-construct cage. "Ren, help!" He screeched.

"Noy jitat!" Ren panicked himself as the projectiles flew, but connected with the tree beside him instead. "Niddler!" He shouted to his detained pal. His fearful eyes flashed as another cage was raining down upon him this time. He narrowly missed entanglement. Bloth was here? Couldn't be, no one was around. Not even hiding in bushes. The attacks ended and he sidled forward to free Niddler, hefting up the thin pen of timber. "I guess whoever lived here really wanted to make sure the Treasure was safe." Ren remarked respectively, shifting his eyes for any additional dangers. He hearkened to aberrant and disturbing noises coming from beasts on the land.

"I really want to get off this island! We have the Treasure, can we please go?" Niddler's melody recoiled, frightened and pleading when he jumped into Ren's arms after being freed.

Ren serenely patted Niddler's head as he appraised his surroundings. "It's not safe to stay here another night-Wait, Niddler. We don't know which way we came in. If we choose the wrong direction, we won't be able to return to the glider or Ioz and Tula. We need the polar winds to get us home." Ren stood still, bringing up a point that had not been previously mentioned. He browsed all around the lush and denseness of the muggy jungle. He thought it to be peculiar evermore that there was no spot of resident life except for what might have existed inside the pyramids. "The sign did say to go to the path of white." He stopped to ponder. He beckoned at last to the only pathway that seemed to contain a clearing of the trees. "That way!" He uncomfortably announced, running and pulling the tugging Niddler behind him.

Ren swept great and far through the only definitive line on the terrain. It proceeded to become less like the climate of which the seaboard had been encompassed by upon arrival as he continued on. It started to turn cold, snowy even. "How strange, Niddler." Ren mused dubiously. "This doesn't look anything like the way we came in." The ocean-eyed boy scoured all around at the frigid land.

"While I must say this is a nice break from the heat, it's freezing!" The red-feathered monkeybird chattered amid a bone-chilling shiver. He strapped his arms and wing feathers close to himself, wrapping his slender frame for warmth. Ren had begun to tremble now too, he was poorly dressed for cold but before now, he did not have any awareness of such temperatures ever existing on Mer at all. The bleating noise made a line into their ears. "It wants to eat us!" Niddler startled into an even more terrorized hysteria at seeing the gruub-rhino on the frontier. It raised it's head to bellow, bearing a fossil set of splintering incisors but before it could flee, pitched away a snared palm-branch from one rack of many antlers. The bramble fell on Ren, who pulled it away from the monster by instinct. Feeling relieved, the scared rhino bashed it's escape amid the forest.

"Let's just get to the end of this jitatan island!" Ren desperately breathed out with weak and chilly exhales. "From there we can go South and we should be able to get back." He stated with waning certainly in this foreign territory, these plants were not common to any on Mer. The idea of how wholly impossible to navigate these organic corridors were, was becoming. Low-hanging flowers revealed a nullity but more white blooms and flights of grasses. Any object too far apart could be lost in a sinkhole of raining petals and stickling silver. The twain castaways propelled to make it hastily through the patch of frost and the diminishing hailstorm. Ren halted forwardly, clutching his knees to take a breather. The monkeybird next to him swelled over and caught his breath.

"We made it out alive!" Niddler panted from racing too fast. There had been an exotic mist coming from oddly-formed trees in the icy section of the land.

"Right." Ren happened to feel a bit tired, his eyes drooped.

"Can I ask you something Ren?" Niddler breezily advanced to conjure.

"What?" With folding pupils Ren tilted his mind to the monkeybird.

"Why did you forgive me after I told you how many years it takes a monkeybird to fly?" Niddler hummed slowly, a calm wish becoming still.

"If you told the truth about your past, why would you lie about anything else?" Ren graciously evoked out of a sinking consciousness. "Fly us away from this island." He flatly initiated with a drowsy point leeward, quickly snapping his eyes open.

"Actually, Ren, I'm kind of drained. Can we take a break?" The monkeybird begged his leader, he started to feel very lethargic and he yawned.

"We can't, Niddler, we're so close..." Ren's words trailed off as he felt himself becoming very sleepy.

"Please? Just for a little while? I'm so tired...It's so far to fly back..." Niddler appealed pleadingly, he could not even manage to keep his taxing eyelids from failing on him.

Ren pondered with snoozy eyes, he had not realized how truly fatigued he was. "Fine, but just for a few moments." The depleted prince sighed and yawned, he could not fight the sore ache of his body for the rhythm. He felt as if all constitution of his spirit withered from him. Niddler had made a bed for himself with the stray grasses of dead brush below, already on his face and asleep. Ren sat down to the side of the dolor simian but fell into a strewn-out position, at last crashing into a bottomless slumber. The mist from the island did not bring the adventurers sweet dreams, it brought Ren a terrifying nightmare of he and Niddler screaming and clawing at impenetrable nets, one which was far too real.

When the prince awoke, his head hummed from a heavy daze. He could not recognizably see himself or things around him, he felt his head pounding. It felt damp and humid wherever he was, and dark. His hands were very sore, he could only faintly lift them or even move them. He picked up noises, what he gathered were the sounds from men speaking. His vision started to enter in to clarity, but he could not see much. Mere blobs of color. Fuschia with forest green, and a dull periwinkle that seemed to congregate some distance away. The voices persisted to become louder. He sensed a thud, a vibration. Something very colossal was stomping toward him, his overpowered eyes of blue started to regain some lucidity. That's when it all came back. Noy jitat. Where was Niddler? Where in the twenty seas of Mer was Niddler?

"You're going to tell me how to use this jitatan thing, boy, and you're going to tell me now!" The bestial requisition came and a hand snatched his chin. Ren's flustered eyes flared open. "Why does it glow like that?" It demanded answer.

There was a gold object emitting a lambency held in front of his face, Ren glanced up at his attacker. He wanted to scream. He was chained to the wall. "Never!" Ren fragilely pressed out. He helplessly thrashed his arms, and it did no good. He could not manage to free his hands regardless of how hard he attempted, to his distraught. His mind welled up with infuriated dissent, and then became terror-stricken of his circumstance. The days when he had taunted Bloth like a super-fast mouse to a prowling korba-cat had toppled over on him, his violent and imprisoning enemy was cross.

"Spare your energy, jitata boy, you're not getting away this time. You should have joined me when you had the chance, Son of Primus." The cruel laugh lingered in the air. "I'm going to take what I need from you, find out what I need from you, and then I'll leave you here to rot!" The harsh and stabbing voice dealt like it could kill. "You'll never see the light of day again, prince." The sinister hiss ricocheted through the dank prison of stone, all the youth could see was one cold light of yellow, full of malice as it was staring down at him and a salient blade stationed under his throat.

"Bloth." Another hoarse tone met Ren's ears.

"What?!" Bloth growled as he wrecked around to meet the source of the intrusion. The sword from Ren's neck lowered and the unprotected lad drew in a sudden breath.

"I found this outside, what do you want done with it?" Ren's eyes focused on the skinny being clothed of a pale marine, who addressed the storming aggressor within the chamber. He carried in his hand a pistol, the same kind the Dark Disciples utilized. Ren's sardonic thoughts moiled about what a great situation this would be.

Bloth's sight allot a horrified gaze at the contained substance. "Get that abomination away from me! Now, Mantus!" Bloth roared out and backed up, awfully disturbed by the presence of dark water in the room.

"What's the matter, Bloth? Afraid of a little dark water?" Ren choked out the most foolish taunt he could have at his enemy, one which he would soon regret.

Ren watched his foe clutch the 13th Treasure of Rule within hand, in ward of the revolver threatening himself. He then subverted to face him. "You're in no position to mock me, boy!" Ren's treacherous competitor chuckled. "I know I can't destroy you, but when I find out how to use this I'll make sure your eternal end is a slow and...miserable one!" The callous and slithering covenant of his nemesis did not fade in the prince's mind.

"Bloth, we can't do anything effective against him. We'll have to obtain more resources from the Pole to be productive in obtaining his cooperation, otherwise we'll have to chance our luck in the Dragon's Maw." Mantus informed his master of a keen detail, to which Bloth bat an atrocious eye.

"May you twist in the Abyss! The North Pole is too far away now! We forgo voyage to the Dragon's Maw until we learn of the Treasures, how can you not understand we don't have time for this?! Mantus, I haven't been this angry since after the dark water broke my ship in half and ate it! Bloth manifested his situational rage in the cell, hoisting up a stashed crate and chucking it into a bare corner at an angle away from Mantus. Ren could not hide a laugh at the first amusing picture he had been granted since his capture and was immediately shot a scowl. "What do you think is funny, boy?!" The brute snipped while Ren almost did not hush.

"Even if we wait, we'll still need protection from the geological changes. Our best option without the Maelstrom is the Pole, it's easier to navigate than the Dragon's Maw." Mantus sensibly argued. Ren darted eyes on the glowering rail who plod a foot on a small parka on the floor. After the righthandman realized his flub, he instantly moved off.

"Then our trump card will have to be replaced with another because the North Pole isn't as potent as the Dragon's Maw, at least not in damage potential. Those poor leviathans could never find their sanctity." The callous pirate gnarled cunningly, flashing a sinister glare at Ren. The restrained noble burned, picking up on the obvious flaunt of superiority.

"I don't care, Bloth. Unchain me, naja-dog, and I'll take you both on like I did in your wretched hatch!" Ren bellowed with mad opposition, quenching his own resistance. He could still not impede his fear from flooding, he showed an inkling of weakness. Unfortunately, he was forced to endure the tremendous howls of Bloth and Mantus.

"Too bad you don't remember how to free yourself." Bloth bit in a dry rib. Ren uneasily focused on the adversary who found himself in the mood to play games again. Ren held back a shudder as the villain stepped forward. "You didn't expect I would reach you eh, Ren? You thought everything was going so well for you, I'm sure. Oh what a time I'll have when I find out where your wretched chums are." His chilling growl hung, he rounded away from Ren. "Come, Mantus. We'll search that jitatan lighthouse again!" Bloth barked as he made his way out of a nearby and onerous door, slamming it shut.

Ren suffered in his mind. Jenna, no! Where was Niddler? Bloth didn't have Ioz and Tula, yet. He yanked with all his might at the chains that bound his spread arms to the wall and could not muster a pull free. That slinking consultant shot him a sadistic grin at his desire to escape and also roved for the door, he hadn't left yet. Ren thought of one idea that could just work. "Mantus." Ren called the lank one by his name and saw that his subject curiously twisted around. "That's your name, isn't it?" He wittingly asked. Of course it was, but this would be his only one-on-one encounter with the smart henchman who crewed directly under Bloth.

The frail Right-hand curved and scuffed over to him, standing with one curled hand rested on a hip. He deliberately abode far enough away that Ren could not kick at him. "Yes, Son of Primus. I'm honored you remember me. His Majesty enjoyed a slumber in the Teyuat grove, I'll say? Strategic disadvantages are always the most fulfilling." The swordman's voice trickled with pure amusement, as if he only turned around by sheer happenstance.

"I didn't know you laughed with K's." Ren found solace with one sarcastic counter. Mantus seemed moreover unfazed.

"Are you going to beg, boy? I wouldn't plan on stealing from me. Even if you get the key, Bloth still has the key to the other arm. Konk may fall for your tricks, but I won't. He is not allowed in here." Bloth's tactician coolly warned, Ren kept note of it.

"I'm not." Ren admitted simply, his eyes defeated and downcast.

"Well then, get to the point!" Mantus snarled impatiently.

"I just want to know..." Ren bore up at his sneering jailer. "What do you get out of following Bloth? He lost his ship and his crew, he can't intimidate you anymore!" Ren pursued with vigilant but resolute words.

Mantus raised a bald brow at this and then paused, he broke out into an unhinged laugh. "Nice try, boy! I think it's pretty obvious what I get out of following him, Son of Primus!" The plunderer snubbed off the boy's words like bilge. With ragged fingers, he stroked the bag of coins that was belted at his waist. He leered smugly at the stewing adolescent. "I imagine Bloth will find Ioz soon, and his burial at sea will be a rich bonus." He could have driven his terror home, but instead he began to wipe his steel with a shining cloth and partially split his attention.

Ren was shocked at the audacity of the second-in-command, but there was nothing he could do. "Why, Ioz didn't do anything to you." The kindly lad felt bitterness bite his tone as he tried to keep his level. He summoned his arms once more, but soon gave up under exertion.

"Do you pretend to know that, boy?" Mantus reeled an acute grimace and an acrid response. "Time is gold." The taller one shrugged and started to pivot astray, any interest whittling elsewhere. Ren strove for something to latch onto.

"What do you think will happen when he does take over Mer?" Ren dared with vigorous prominence, trying to shake some sense into the man. "Do you think he'll leave you as his second-in-command forever? What happens when you can't do anymore for him, do you think he'll pay your leave? I don't know what Bloth has promised you, but...you know what he does to the rest of his crew..." He honestly discoursed with contempt of the things that his antagonist had done, he was trying to reason.

Mantus would have to be angry at Ren stating the obvious, only because what Ren proclaimed was truth. Though he knew it, he would not entertain it. "I know how to handle Bloth, insect!" The ex-commander vocalized his ire through decayed teeth. "You're such a worthless juvenile. I have work to do, I don't have time for this smilge! Jitata brat!" He growled and deviated away, thinking this was a waste.

"You're an idiot." Ren mumbled weakly as the warden turned to leave. Mantus lashed around, something set him off.

"I'm a idiot, you say?" The evil second-in-command whisked slyly as he again approached the yellow-haired boy, scheming eyes of steel stabbed at the prince's heart. Only an instant had passed before the blunt edge of Mantus's blade collided in a harmless tap against Ren's head. The young man would have been shot sidewards by the force behind it, the thump against the temple was so quick to it's destination that it closely left him in shock. "I'm not such an idiot as you to go against the man who is in charge, Son of Primus, prisoner." The master swordsman coldly rebuked the particularly harsh and final words with a sneer as he hitched his weapon and trudged away. He bolted the latch to the heavy door behind him, leaving Ren alone in desolation.

The prince was not sure if Mantus had been aware those words made sense for both of them. He still felt the disarrayed breeze. He would have to get out of here, somehow. Ioz was importunately in danger. He needed to know where Niddler was. He almost did not want to think about it, Yellow-Wing was evidently after his friend too. Bloth would use the Treasures of Rule and then Mer would be destroyed, he feared his failure. Noy jitat. Ren pored over the small dungeon, which was almost completely shadowed from any contour except for the dreary brume of torchlight. Never did he feel so miserable as now.

In a lighthouse South of Octopon, there was a middle-sized ship docked just off shore. The door of the bottom chamber flung open. Two raiders stormed into the room.

"I can smell their pain, Lord Bloth." The phlegmatic voice made another living soul in the basement quiver as she watched him swing about a torch in the darkened ambiance, crooked teeth abraded underneath the glow.

"I have to reach Jenna..." The soft cry whispered, unheard and unseen. The owner of the sound grasped for a missing item about her bare neck, panic began teeming in. The dripping from the distant ceiling caused tremors in her blood.

"Good, then they can't be far. Once we find them, we'll be able to use them as a sufficient bargaining chip. I tire of that brat's impudence. This is supposedly where the remaining Treasures should be." The gravely grit of repugnance blasted from the frame of the stone entryway.

"Stop! Why are you here, pirates?" Another habitant burst out of the woodwork with a demand before the looters could trudge any further, to the astonishment of the stowaway and the pirates. "What?!" The aghast protector coughed with anguish and terror, he stabilized and spun a spiritually-charged scythe within his palms.

"Well, well. What do we have here. I'm displeased to inform you that Iskjar didn't make it, but maybe you will if you tell me of the River from the North." The bulkiest pillager snatched the half-kree by the throat with a loathsome torment, and slammed him back to the floor without delay.

"You'll pay for what you did to him! Leave here now! You stole my bride from me, now I'm not going to let you get away with taking my Grandfather's life!" Xiluk tensed into a combat-ready stance. He sweat from a creeping misery but he would invoke every charm he had been taught from birth, should he need to. Only one source of aquatic energy would be at his disposal. The well in the locked alcove of the spire could not be entered without the Key of Access, but it led from the encircling drainage-moat. Bloth simply signaled with his head, and the lackey grunted then approached with a sword.

"If I had only studied less...if I had only stayed, I wanted to make Vaecusa happy and wait until you, Xiluk wanted to..." Hushing of a rueful lass wept in the grayed enclosure. This part was not well known. The keeper hid away with the heir in this compartment only once and apparently had used the chunky dragonbow she now protected in her arms, the last bolt was still loaded.

"It-it's you, Mantus! Stand down, villain! If you're going to continue to be evil, then I'm going to punish you! You can't defeat my power of bravery, time for battle!" Xiluk confidently backed up toward the flooding ring and twirled the rune staff with a stunning enchantment. Jenna and her niece were the only occupants to live in the beacon of Octopon now and he feared his efforts may be futile due to the Baurabor's prophesy, but his voyage would mean something to them...to make up for his past mistakes.

The kree boy had only raised the water disc up above his head with the desire to seal the aggressors in encasing ice, that was when he peeked down at the fiery stone on the ring in his palm. He lost his nerve after a mental mention of his former passion but moreso the realization that there was, and never would be enough wind inside the lighthouse to generate a targeted blizzard. Soul Storms would only reach the Nahrook if he thanked the wind and the water for granting him power and this day, he arrogantly forgot to. The assaulting weapon was cast after a grating crow, and he outcried.

The last trifle of the golden strands in Xilok's angelic hair prematurely transformed to a rusty bronze as he inhaled his final sigh, he was thrown into the cylindrical basin with his hand left gripping on to the leg cloth until it was kicked away.

"Xiluk, you fool!" With shedding tears and a silent scold, an associate watched him fade away. She shuddered the bow.

"I wonder who that was, Bloth." The curious assassin questioned as he bent over to place Xiluk's ring on his own finger. "Many of our ground forces are infested and need blood-plasma. Taikal is insidious for it's toxic smoke." The less bombast of the savage guests cautioned.

"I would surmise someone who hasn't seen an Evil Prince before." The chuckle of the authority trilled. "As for the men, let them drink grog. Worse they're spared if they can't handle Octopon. I do not see Ioz or Tula. I think your senses may be off the mark, Mantus, or our Good prince's friends are in another lighthouse." The massive figure mouthed an agitated criticism, plans had not gone as originally thought.

The helpless observer only discerned crashing sounds and sights of crates being knocked over. Glass broke. The ripping and ravaging of the room slowly transpired before the eyes of the hidden one.

"Perhaps they have been here. Accounting for the sleep-duration of flying beasts through a straight course, we know it takes a minimum of five days at One-Nine Gales to reach Octopon from Takrar-town, and we've taken the boy that long. With this ocarina forged by the Guyfoo Capsule, we have the Andorian wench right where we want her and Ioz has two very exploitable weaknesses...ale and wealth."

I doubt our Tayhojian marksman has said anything to Ren, but his woman has my interest...piqued. Bloth, the secret of the Treasures of Rule will grant us more wealth than we can imagine. I could use a new, lively...asset to carry my spoils and any extra gold for us, Sir." The artful duelist assessed the contents of a slop-chest for bangles and prize to smuggle, flitting a glim at a skeletal portion.

"What kind of...asset do you have in mind, Mantus? We don't have time to be hunting down that thieving friend of his or every wench valuable to the man. Where Ioz rests his sword when he pays for port-fare is not my concern." Bloth took no interest in the need for chances, instead on his shrp? scabbard's maul.

"Everything in this room will be taken as the spoils of plunder. Before we raze this entire area, shall we spare the Octopiean wenches who aren't of any use? It is true regents' daughters enjoy dancing and rejoicing to their prosperity..." The slick lord's commander gnarled a rancid remark, stroking the gem fixed upon the fallen ring. "Under bountiful fortune-seekers." He suggested a counter operation. The spectator could have shrieked for ?the forecasting character smoothed his seat on a tarp perforated by a heap of Draja-rum, but she choked to conceal her respiration.

Bloth mulled over the accomplice's idea in consideration. "We have no need to pillage the city or raid ?temple if we know they will come straight for us." The wicked thug ultimately decided. The only woman in the room shifted her handheld dart in preparation for an indecisive launch, unaware that the trawl made a noise. The beast sniffed the stale air. "I smell a rat." He uttered a damaging phrase.

"Opps...!" The young lass cried out under her breath, heart skipping. Her hands loosened.

"Chuuk!" The shattering noise rung from the underling who leapt at the stout maiden before she could react, he controlled her by the arm.

"Speak of the Dark Dweller, looks like Kuunda has heard you. This rebellious princess comes with her dress. Did you enjoy your retaliation? Don't take our intrusion personally, your highness." Bloth heartlessly mocked the sight of the squirming hostage.

"Ah, no! Noy ji-!" plethora of , the blond diva screamed while she could not move. The scraggy hand had contained her by the throat, and pressed a blade into her neck. "Let me go! I'll make you both jitatan sorry when I get out of this!" Her empty threat screeched. Jazhea's thrashing and flipping was met by another gladdened chuckle from the big plunderer and the leggy captor squeezing the metal tight in, necessitating her cooperation. She could hardly breathe now, at that.

"Wait, stop!" Hidden behind a nestled compartment, a scrunched figure yowled as she threw away a crumpled tarp. "She didn't do anything, leave her alone!" Solia trembled as she met vision for the first time with these horrendous pirates. Mantus and Bloth weren't anything liken to ? her brother, Ioz had described, abominable could only fit her tab.

"Don't tell me you're being unfaithful, fine misses! Looks to be we have a new fair maiden...hmm. I would like to demolish the remainder of Primus's heirs, instead..." The nasty lord grunted in witness of the softer of the ladys' as she had made her habitation known. He followed a topaz iris to the examination of the sturdy resident's maw and her yellow teeth, Jazhea tried to swivel her jaw away from Mantus's snag.

"You want this one, Bloth? What shall we do with her?" Mantus's frigid eyes snubbed Solia while he heckled the prisoner in his clutches, imploring his boss. He grabbed Jazhea by the collar in a swift move to make her kneel on the ground, the lean sword firmly depressed into her larynx. "Down, wench." His quiet wisp demanded.

"Of course, Mantus, keep her alive for Ren to see. Whichever one of them becomes your rejected shipwife can be used for our experiments." Bloth precariously dictated.

The high-born dame would have breathed an abated sigh, but then she abruptly stopped. Across the alcove, Solia was cold in her tracks.

Mantus uncivilly grunted, his degrading laughter struck out. "Milord, do you think it wise to find out if she is carrying gold on her? Should we decide on her keep after her use, it may be efficient to make her a permanent accompaniment for swabbing our deck and..." The virulent rascal disgustingly snarled. "Alternatively, scrubbing our living quarters. Bloth, I know this is bad luck, but much more effective." Bloth nodded while Mantus forced on the braided woman an evil stare.

"Then by all means, I'm sure you'll prepare our Kalinda Queen for her...Welcoming institution. She's not a worthy auction-off to be taken to Janda-town for tools right now, and I want nothing from the blood of that boy or...the other one. Bring your wench up to the old woman and we'll give you a more, perpetuating celebration...for your...blast, Sword-Point Anniversary. We'll deck the Tidal-Lilacs in your absence." The Captain grumbled with a wink to the second-in-command as he lumbered for the exit.

"What about Ioz's sister?" Mantus stealthily reposed his interest on a nauseated Solia before Bloth could step into the hall.

"Hmm...Solia, that rawboned-wench. Aghhr. The thief who has stolen the heart of my best battle-contriver is here, and she is that despicable Tayhojian's blood. In that case...!" Bloth cracked up. "Mantus. Show them both what our meaning of unpleasant is...but know leisure cruises don't sail permanently bound to daybreak!" With a clenching fist, he warned in an afterthought. He could be seen making a visible and disgusted gag on the way out. Mantus's chops craned into a rapturous curl. Though Solia detested Bloth as much as her brother always had, she shrilly begged for a reconsideration of no.

"'Hoy, Boss! That hook-armed naja-muzzle is docking 'er like you asked!" The gorgeous brunet clacked to the doorframe behind Bloth and Mantus. Leaning up against the solid brick, she flayed her curly tresses to notice the Commander's poor pickings for gratification. "What losers." She smirked with a playful supremacy. Mantus's envious scowl connected with the buxom lady-pirate. "So, Bloth, who is this, Tula-wench?" Viira withdrew a pouch of coin from her pink blouse and after sheathing her cutlass, grinning eyes flashed exotic green.

"Ahh, my vilest Viira." Bloth smiled on the beautiful vixen, from the busty corset to the silken headscarf and the matching pants. "Tula is nothing like these...rejects, scum-bucket dame." He riveted on Viira as she viciously cringed at the less-shapely females, with an ogle he handled the excited wench's lower back.

"Yes, Bloth." The merchant-classed lass frightfully listened to the macho prowler's croaking reply. Solia watched a cutthroat-monarch wedge the door into a snug frame after walking out with the ebony beauty, leaving crew-heroes' sisters alone in the colorless lobby with the haggard wretch.

Following his assurance Solia would not move, Mantus didn't waste time with backing her tawny counterpart to the only light source and pointing the blade at her core. "This is how we find out if they're good shipping-material. Being enslaved to our crew isn't all they're good for, so we take them back for Sport, or maybe to dig for the Gem Market." He crinkled his neck to follow a swooping sound.

"What if they are not?" The nearby warble vocalized.

"We tie their feet and leave them without their gold and gems, but we only take them if they don't have any brawn and can dance through a typhoon with no seasickness. Captured ships will bargain the finest of their sailors for an invaluable first-mate." The devious commander hounded the endangered royal.

"You humans are funny, we lay eggs." The accessory squawked.

"Search the wreckage for anything valuable." Mantus flayed his attention from a feather to herd the boyish princess securely in front of a bevy of crates.

Solia struggled with anything to do in the situation. Her thieving wiles had gotten her out of such a sticky mire before, but she was never in a placement like this. Big brother wasn't here, and he wouldn't be. Mantus's attention was on another, for now, but that would not last forever. There was a grate in the floor by her toes. She could maybe wiggle it loose, but there was enough room for only one person to slip through in scarce time.

"What in Kuunda's tavern do you want?" Jazhea harshly scrapped and let out a slipped kick, a bice circle floating in front of her eyeline.

"Pure Ruukaana sells for double the price of steel on this side of the Maalagar strait, truly rare. Rare, but Knowledge pays more. Don't think you won't pay for humiliating me. I know you don't doubt that I'm still Bloth's scariest bladesman on land, as I am on water." Mantus delivered as he paced to and fro, seemingly trying to view her in a better vantage.

"Of course not! Ruukaana, how nice! King Primus put an end to the shipping of Ruukaana ore from Valjen once he realized he was lied to about what was happening in the Mines of Qui-Qua, and he was just furious about the whole thing! I bet you didn't know that piece of trivia-! So how is life working for Bloth, as his umm...fortune-keeper?" Jazhea nervously laughed, a short shriek following. Shifting away as far as possible, her mind was certainly ready to explode from any perspective.

"Refined, like gold. Golden women are a rich bet, Daughter of Primus. In your fortunate case, your secret hearsay is preferred more than your weath." Solia quavered as he addressed the slave in her view. It made no difference to her that Jazhea was related to Ren, her crush.

"Ahoy, pal! Why don't we raid...the kleepa-cart, have us some tankards and talk this out like deckhands! That's just as fun...do you want to know where? Try the lefthand-corner. Just the thing to forget all our problems and desires to hash them out! No? Ok! So that's...just fine! I never was planning to sail away with another sailor's cargo!...Especially when you keep it in a chest that floats above water when it's full of gold-. Kuunda help me!" Mantus sprang his head to make note of Jazhea's hassling word on his Aksort chest and turned back. Another patter of flitting boots scattered for the very corner.

"I don't think I need to tell you who wears the other half of this relic. Traitor Ioz knows Guuda-bay is full of this honored metal, and I'll bet he'll be the first to figure out how your contribution was stolen from you. How mysterious you know the matter of Captain Mizar's release, and you know what penalty his daughter experienced at my overseer, Z.M.Q.'s hands, when her riches were still mine. Now, I wonder how many more of my timeless secrets Tayhojian-slime, Ioz, has entrusted you with...I'm interested." The ruthless commander shoved for response from the sorry lifeforme with a chilly palm. He replaced her amulet on it's locate of his neck.

"The Zuuror...of Qui-Qua. The Zuuror more powerful than any Emperor or King." The dame choked on the bleeding fear the ? wrought.

"What an enemy fears is a means of bribbery. Talk, wench." Mantus ripped a blade into the nearest rib and marked the break where it had scored.

"No. Because you're a creep, and you crew for Bloth." The wealthy female loosened a whimper. She scrunched her eyes, then cracked them at a sound. Such a yelp sounded when his crushing boot was planted on her toes. If the cleaved fire of the tormentor were a hair closer, it could have scalded.

"Go back to your bilge-home, darva-rat! Aye, ye smell like you haven't ever seen a lake under the shadow-moon!" Solia ambushed with a kleepa-root stowed in a sling pouch as she jumped off a stack of nearby crates. Jazhea surprisingly was shaking her a no and continually tried to signal with eyes to the escape sewer. There was? a bird's squeal and a thump on impact of the pouch then a pounce, and Mantus was on her like clockwork.

"In the corner with you now and hand over every piece! Flat in front-. That means everything valuable to you. And remove all your...sparkling jewelry." Mantus had been talking about her brother in a context Solia didn't understand but as he threatened her, the most perilous urge to forfeit the contest would never overtake her running spirit.

"Leave my jewelry alone, I spent five moons in Kalinda stealing this gold from a deaf assassin and he was blind too! It wasn't easy, you know!" Solia spat and rudely extended her tongue.

"I don't trust how a wharf-rat with those pretty lips has never before sailed with a sea-worn pirate, besides your brother of course." Mantus fluidly browsed the charming innocent with insect orbs pierced directly to her stony heart, his obsessive sway lingering.

"Wha-what in the ka-jin-ga are you talking about? What do you want from me, maggot-lips? Who told you I was Ioz's sister-ay ji?" Solia baffled with questioning ? as she twirled her nycra-shooter in line to ward him off. She had not noticed herself being lured to a dooming cranny in shadows, but beneath the vents could be seen his coarse skeleton through the narrow slats.

"Oh, can you imagine the fun?" When Mantus's warm breath surfaced he was stalking Solia as a hunter, waiting patiently as if she were a delicious bug to devour.

"Ay...I've seen you before...in Kalinda and Janda-town a few times. You stole that fruit for me I wanted so badly, in Pandaawa-City! I ate three days until I was fat and full because of your sneaky trick." The revelation hit a sable-skinned woman in an unexpected flash. This silent stranger who stood in front of her eyes she recognized as one who often interacted with her in the many ports she sojourned in. "So it's you Liege Mizzen-Conquest, throw in your best coin if you want to take a chance on Kezu's old rental barge...skinny man? You scamp! Loser pays grub...and grog, this round!" Solia trawled to a distraction of the pouch of gold she harvested from some unruly-bum, she suddenly maintained a sway of confidence.

"This round we're playing for keeps, my elusive tycoon." Mantus bulged one chiton-faced glance at Solia's stash and chuckled. He picked off her wages and slunk in front to almost seal her getaway with his bony rib-cage weighting to her.

"Or you could just do that. I guess we'll discuss the pitfalls of our thick-as-theives partnership in port another day-like how you're...smothering me when you're too close to where I breathe! You learned some moves, didn't you, man? So what is our new heist? Remember that time we charged the guards of that old shrine to the Octoquid for a boat-ride and sent them out to sea, then we ransacked the island of those brainless cat-skaucks? You and I could use some more gold now, don't you think? So-! Let's do it again, and ditch this joint! You're the best...you know." Confused by such a claim, Solia uncomfortably withered among a cove she could not evade.

"I have some moves I want to show you, you may thank Z.M.Q. for teaching me." Mantus's vulgar wrap handled both nails on his living catch's windpipe as a costly prize, his affection for her remained high-esteemed when he twisted her elbow to the spine. Whenever she inhaled her curves in all the perfect places were stretched to his? hungry thirst for action. His allurer whittled her fingertips for an emergency cutlass she stowed in the back sachet but gave in to this...impossible slaughterer.

Solia batted a knee. "So...you're Z.M.Q.'s main man. I thought Bloth was the most of your troubles when you gave me that map of Arakna-. So what is it that the Mystery Man does to his targets which is worse than...death. It's not ickier than the maggots in your nose, is it?" Solia pled to take a jab as her lungs cinched more to constriction by the moment, in naught but the utter jitters. She imagined a nightmare on shore from long ago.

"-Becoming a slave to our pirates...or being disposed of by a man-eating sea-beast is nothing to the suffering of those who anger Z.M.Q., and his shipmates." Mantus answered surely. "Z.M.Q. is not after you, so there is no need to worry. The only task you need think of is providing me with some gratifying victory in my Sport with a reckless Maelstrom-traitor you know very well." When the ? eyed her with dreaming bloodlust his abrasive knuckle touched the feminine chin in preparation for the night of her life.

"Aiieee! Stay away from me, scum-face! You're evil and ugly as sin!" Solia combat against hindrance with a mediocre bombardment from a tiny sail-eater. "I mean, you care too much about my brother. You gada-nut! I mean it nicely, friend, but you're really scaring me with this game-I liked it better when we were stealing Bentaar-pears together-! You don't mean that...you're actually-" Her brave heart was unflawed until the anticipating enemy's sword pressed into her collarbone as she failed to scurry back up the fortress of crates. Four fingers bonded all the way around her arm, roping her to his form near the rubble.

"I've been waiting for the right time to find and steal his sister away, that mutineer's sweet blood...for so long on my radar, those charming bones will now belong to me and I will take my much-earned revenge on your open bounty." It wasn't until Viira's drowning scream down from the crawlspace reached her ears that the underlying reason why Bloth had gone hit Solia, her eyes became as pinpricks.

There was another reason...sister. There is a no-man who is chasing you...trying to cause you harm, he'll hunt you down...won't rest until you're broken...because he is envious of what I have. Ioz's words in sickness struck. Solia cringed to a loss of sanity.

"Yo-ha-chakka-ha-wa. Give Ioz my regards for his appropriate absence, my stingy-maw Solia. Don't fear, on you I'll only follow the unpleasant orders for less than a moonset-. The uncomfortable ending will be over in no time." Solia could hear a grim grunt when Mantus squeezed his spidering hand over her choked cheek and was leaning down to a clasp. When she jumped out with an elbow-swipe to keep him from restraining her at the knees she was cornered, and Mantus was a skilled destroyer.

Shivering and shaking was now all Solia was capable of, her oval sightline was locked on the longing glint in the Commander's shriveled sneer. "Noy borga...Nevermind! I thought I was your friend, not your next spoil!" Solia outright shrieked and after already having broken into a cold sweat from a state of panic, fright desecrated her in the caging storage-basement. "You weren't making this up, were you...Big brother, why did I have to leave you? No! No, don't!" Never did she want Ioz more than now.

"Try to run! By the bounty of rejoice I'll enjoy chasing you...and salting the grub in your Puuka-Luuka-p-" With a jolting heart-rate Solia scampered about the supply cellar for her dear life, away from a predatory Mantus's curdled passion. Moisture smothering Solia's brow, she heaved the entire nycra-baby at him. Her heel slapped his cheek but he irritably beat her down. His nails swiped at her slender leg before he arched his neck to flop the gummy creature.

"Mantus! Sir Phorlock and Ioz both taught me the ropes, they protected me like you did! So stop!" Jazhea was adamantly refusing to divulge info at all as she strayed a hint to her partner. Something metal racketed and hit him, upon declining from Solia's shape Mantus's tracing steel floated and crossed an X over the taunting woman's gut.

"You won't be leaving here-and you'll do what your told, worthless brood-slug. Get to work on cracking those tiles." Mantus had slunk back over to Jazhea to callously inspect the proceeding of what he wished her to do. To such straining disarray, he kicked her to the floor.

?

"Do it yourself, I don't want to get dirty! A benevolent millionaire will be here today and I won't look like a bracken-handed wharf-rat! If you were going to fear Bloth's vengeance for letting Mizar go, then maybe you shouldn't have done so. By the way Ioz kicked me out for being too slow in the topsail, and because of my Z.M.Q. mark." Jazhea complained on hands and

"A benevolent millionaire? You'll beat a path for me into my Treasure Empire with your bloody knuckles...if you don't want to see the venom, or your matey Ioz to be restrained like you are...and I'll have that password to break the Seal of the River from you." Mantus all but laughed. "You'll be quiet, unless you want to eat something besides griel-liver." His threat promised she was torn sparse by liquified fear. Solia shuffled uncontrollably when the demeaned captive shuddered a negative.

"I'm not betraying their Quest! I'm done being this joke of arrangement! The Key in this chamber it too powerful for you to use, Mer will be destroyed with such a curse unless Ioz is told the hives will be coming soon...he's the only one who will understand. Do to me, threaten all you want. You lose." Jazhea slyly alerted Solia with the tricky fluttering of her laden lids. The duo could only communicate wordlessly. She tapped her foot, Solia retreated with a drop to the ground.

"You'll enjoy testing my patience a second time!" Jazhea was helpless against the speed of Mantus's movements, a snap of her arm breaking at the elbow was all she gained for company. "All the more reason to keep you here. It is too bad Z.M.Q. did not sting your bones more slowly or I don't think you would be addressing me that way." Mantus instead pushed the subject at his mercy into the caving corner, growling a single command.

"Noy jitat! Don't touch me, kreld-eater! I'd rather die than be your driveling smool-brain of a wharf-rat-florascum again! I wouldn't be helping any of them if you weren't trying to imprison me as your cabin-item, barnacle-reeking worm-stinger!" Jazhea painfully clashed, a chain-link yoke attached on her neck from a previous escape rattled. She toughly mustered a hampered kick.

"How entertaining the sparkling Princess of Octopon has a soiled vocabulary. You'll receive your reward for not spitting it out when I find the way to the power below this soil!" The vicious strategist taunted along his watch of a slinking Solia. "You're helping Bloth, as you help Ren." The commander's blunt edge burned when it cracked on her back with accuracy. Mantus fumbled upon a rage at having lost a set of instructions more valuable than the draublin-bar, Jazhea was no piece of jewelry worthy of the map she gave away.

"M-Mantus, you should let us both go. You know, our mother left Ioz and I a large inheritance after Z.M.Q. left our town in ruin, but I'm afraid if I spend it on me, it will go to waste..." Solia cringed in the scent of fresh betrayal, her savvy breath went faint as she prodded her own knife at Mantus to break up the dismantling. She ran forward to defend the vulnerable noble with a comforting wrap. Solia begged to make certain neither one of them would be Mantus's sparring-partner when midnight drew nigh, but luck did not grin.

"If you happen to know where another Treasure of Rule is, perhaps." Mantus only scoffed and pierced Solia a chilling brow. Likely, a dishonest oath.

Jazhea's glare continuously disapproved of her interference. Solia was vastly in more danger, and there would be no bargaining this time. "Regards to you, festering slug-toad. Just get it over with, and you might want to ask your friendly sludge-spawn for that. You'll still lose." The breaking woman wrenched.

"I think I'll take my risks, I've never before ransacked a room while there was a mutinous princess inside. You're in luck, I haven't obtained any R&R since I've been here. Dance." Mantus insidiously dictated. He cruelly hacked down the obstruction of a maltsack in his way.

"I didn't know pirates danced." Terrified and tearstriken, Jazhea began to pelt her feet back and forth.

"Very amusing, but very insufficient, femme, considering not even you will escape with any of your wealth intact." Mantus's harsh jeer was insidiously brittle.

"Simply letting me beg Kuunda's forgiveness would be an affordable mercy you could allow, this time? My last days...corrected is not something I want to experience. Please...anything else!" Jazhea's tragic pleas sung with a jolt of reluctance.

"Should I play my vow like a fair man and put my odds on the wench's handicap this time? Naturally, I carry out my orders and my Princess of Octopon wins all the gold if she is victorious, but If I'm victorious, I'll win every valuable owned in here." The laugh creaked from the wilted jaw as Mantus leapt in reverse and strew his stance to direct his metal at her, blinding his own vision with a sword over his eyeline. "Your move." He gave her a start, a window for attack. His face was dreadfully staid. He was serious.

Jazhea despairingly reached for the fallen launcher, cursing the lighthouse for being so warm. Those words could cause a scream, one she wouldn't stop. Pain had set in. The room flicked between torchlight and the empty black of her affliction.

"I know just what twine of destitution I have planned for you now, smool-brained woman. My turn, I'll collect my payment from our game." The hoodlum's snicker raised with a conquering demeanor at the new idea. He eyed up a target, contemplating the next move and tilting his head as if to inspect her from a different angle. His punishing yet delighted facade visibly lit up.

"You can't possibly be so coldhearted. Saytash and Phorlock, they still care." Jazhea pleaded with the devilish soul, but the glittering spark of hesitation then vanished.

"That's my whim to determine, miserable wench. Begging is a total waste but bribery can get you more than nowhere, which is where bravery leads." The tough thief lewdly lipped an expectation.

"So will cowardice, and I think you've lost your mind." Jazhea sweat at his goad and aimed that which was too heavy for her at Mantus's heart. Fighting Bloth's assassin was a scary task no one did of their own volition. The distraction of a clink from a thrown knife was tossed out of Solia's locate, Jazhea had swallowed an expletive as the icy eyes were about to shoot away from her thicker skin and to Solia. It was not the princess's lucky shot that doomed her to her fate, but the beaten ping of metal. The arch was dashed out of her fit grip with a single lash of a mighty slicer. She lost all balance, swung to the floor as her energy leaked and poured down.

"Who has lost their mind, Primus's Daughter?" The commander scanned atop his patient triumph over a pitiful warrior. "Come out, come out. I know you want your pathetic brother, but he is a little frozen on the edge right now." He crept for Solia once more. Pulling a narrow fish from his belt, he forced it to swallow a flaming tinder. Mantus slurped on the tail and flinched when the suffering creature expanded with a heart-rending cry as the flames licked the burning insides to a slow death, but those noxious fumes from the Pufferigar's backfin alleviated his terrorizing temper.

"Mantus!" The second invader in the basement cawed, the invoked vied his attention. "I found something over here! It's a depression!" Jazhea shivered intensely. Mantus's focus diverted from one misfortune to another. The fiend nabbed her up and around the midriff. The tantalized lady sadly yelled as he lifted her to trash on a bundle of grain supply.

"Phorlock and Father would both be appalled, they never said anything about making this kind of match. Bloth enjoys polluting their words but he never even knew my name until I tried to threaten him. You won't profit from thievery or...comfort gambling on their holidays. You'll lose." Jazhea bleakly griped. She calmly pushed the razor away from her as he let it recede.

"You'll learn how to act when I have you back under lock and key. Thumbbites should keep you quiet until I know if you're hiding anything...worthy. Move, if you want Eel-blood to rot you before your blind lids close forever." Mantus's grisly threat of ultimate desecration stung. He pushed her off to turn her over the refuse. From humble tongs that were previously stowed in his boot he coated a shredding dagger with a scrap of fresh kelp. The razored prong he pinned point-up in a notch, drenching it to bind a link of her leash.

"Come with me. We're so lucky that stinking bug-faced pirate cares more about games and Treasures than he does about bar-maidens." Meanwhile by a faint wish to urge her partner forward, the careful sister of Ioz freely rigged the entrance of the hatch up by one of her discarded boots and the cord from her vest to prevent an immediate pursuit after the first quick exit. "Why are you still here." Solia hinted at Jazhea as she blinked twice and shouted air. She had showed the girl-cheat the same smile Ioz had given when he told her he would see her in the morning, this fighter's worn muscles had seen more and was used to this suffering. That night Ioz took to the sea all over again from Tayhoj, he would have wanted to say he would see his sister shortly. During the first calm moment Solia reluctantly pried at the gate with the only lockpick.

"I'd never move, even if Eel-possession wasn't the one thing worse than serving you again." Mantus was met with a jerking whimper from the arrested damsel after he strode closer. He plucked her floral earrings and left the burlap to pursue the voice. Jazhea frowned and visibly ground her teeth, though the passage opened at Solia's beckon.

"I'm sure any red-blooded jewelry-bandit would love this setup, but I didn't make a wish in Taikal to fly freely on the strength of dagrons in exchange for blind vision and false safety." Jazhea distressed under the absorptive eel-weapon he had left in her agony, she singed the arm of her dress with acid trying to rescue herself. She watched his mischief that in all manner blocked her escape, be it by assurance of injury or his tampering. "So why not some lucky princess from Qui-Qua to be your...jewelry-carrier?" She unhappily sighed and adjusted vision in the fading room as he continued to stroke the gold embellishments he had stolen from her.

"You know the reason I can't get what I need from you with my own kind on barren Qui-Qua. They disowned me, years ago, and banished me from their new settlement. You're out of work besides, because Solia will meet her...able-bodied swordsman." The avaricious plunderer scoffed. "If these are authentic then worth 20 more drabuls, perhaps..." He appraised the shinning adornments, plucking the petals.

"Under this tile too! Something sparkling. Fifty-fifty for our share, right? Also, should you not be going easy on those expensive Pufferigars? You know Bloth still wants you to pay that sea-weasel warlock before the last sun he'll see." The feathery rascal hailed to the looming crook, revealing under a tile a mass of bountiful wealth. He waited as Mantus stomped out the embers of the previous critter and lit another. Solia's hips wiggled into the cramped tunnel.

"That is what this wench's jewelry is for, like all difficult expenses. You know where my port-funds and gems go, Yellow-Fluff. How generous of them to hide Ren's palace-fund here for us." Mantus was accordingly delighted with the boundless cache of treasure stowed under the flinty plate. He ran his clawed palms through the shimmering gold pieces, collecting some in his rucksack. He lifted a crown fit for a head of his size and laid it atop his hairline with adoration. "We'll collect the profit from the Valjen conquest and Phorlock's buried hoard after these shifting stones reveal their secrets..." Mantus arose to once more scratch a finger into the keyhole to the chamber of the Thirteen window panes.

"I can't imagine why." Jazhea mostly accepted her fate as she tried to transfer her weight and possibly evade the drooling dagger. "I'm stuck here with you and I don't spend my fortune on sea-life cruelty and high-quality sword-sheaths. I find it ironic how you reign from the ?poorest land yet you were born when the palms shed their leaves and you were the youngest to grow your beard. Didn't you tell Ioz how, your true birthplace is dark when he was still one of your krel-" She unfortunately could not divert the uninvited-seekers long enough.

"Quiet, useless wench. I haven't forgotten what I'm going to do after you're back in the Cage. If you're good, I'll even let you earn a meal on clear skies." Mantus gnashed mercilessly, ordering from his inspection of the rectangular dent to the door.

"Because there are more fish when it rains?" Jazhea sincerely entertained as she stared on the empty air-grate.

"No. Because when it rains I'm sleeping off a barrel of grog." The con snickered. "This looks to worth about...80 for each glawn. This is only three parts pure...noy borga, but I can always high-top the selling price." Mantus, by all definition, ignored her. He probed the gilded flowers, thoroughly examining each dainty petal and trace of any gems.

"And here I envisioned a Zuuror wanting all the comforts of royalty." Jazhea attempted to lure him by the surroundings, but this time she was rebuffed. He proceeded to splice the wall with another trace of steel. "Ioz was better at playing Sundown-Salute and he slams down a walloping hand, no way that skillful sailor has ever lost a well-labored lass to any mundayne jib-top! By the way, he says you play Conch Hearts like a kreld-dumping-larva-pelleting loser!" Jazhea was down to her last resort. The track in Mantus's head instantly stopped and his eyes snapped open. He turned around with an infernal gnarl.

"Ioz isn't here, you nervesome-!" Mantus marched over at the prisoner's hooting. "You'll regret those words. Any flora of mine will wish she were dead for a betraying mouth. I'm going to tear away your pretty whining until raffendi's meltdown, waste of an Octopian wench." He menacingly slashed shut the grate.

"Forgive me, but it was worth it! Now take your malice out on someone who deserves it, don't for Mizar's daughter." Jazhea shivered, knowing he suspected a trace of falsehood by her reaction.

"Wrong, you're only well-labored in mundayne lies. You weren't in the Heave-Off, and it wasn't Ioz who told you of my poison. Distractions only work when I don't know about the sword-sized keystone in the doorway to the Treasure Room, and now you've let the one I wanted go free. So make this easy and tell me who you really learned of Thumbbites from. I know it was not Z.M.Q." Mantus angrily grit his jawbone, stepping on her arm with the strength of dragons.

"I prevented you from being a brute! Like I'd help you make Solia into another disposable mind-game for you to run to death." Jazhea wrenched of hostility.

"Mind-game? Hoy! Now understand this, eel-poisoning rotted the venom that was already inside her bones. Mizar's darling paid in full for her betrayal of Bloth and myself, not of my wishes. I made her disappear, but it was as soon as she touched the water. Like so." He deviated from his target momentarily to draw and ferry water from the encircling spring. He splashed it atop the floor, disdainfully chucking the bucket from his zone.

"You harried her." Jazhea furiously snipped his justification short.

"And by taking her loss you've put yourself at risk. Thumbbites extends lifespan, yes, but it wasn't possible for her to live as long as you pitifully think. Eel-fection didn't exist until blundering Konk stocked the weapon's locker with a violet Dartha. How can you believe the blood-plasma that Ioz saw was anything but a mere illusion, how can you trust him when he fails at seamanship and is less skilled at swordsmanship than even I? He is also illiterate in Quiin Draconik as Bloth is, but he knows too much about what I'm trying to protect from a certain pallid bovine-slug. Yes? Good, -flora. I'll make Ioz eat black waves before Ren's time comes, hear me, I will slice his neck. Unless, you trust me." simmered glacial air, confirming his scornful resentment. Assuring retribution, he yanked her shackle from the blade's point.

"Then we'll be made equal when we're screaming in the Dark Abyss together. How did you like underestimating Solia's abilities as a thief? I fear your fate if Ioz finds out. If Tula were his ship-wife, I can't imagine what he would have dealt me when she became Constrictus-bait at my mistake." The runaway bore back with an irate and determined will, she laughed of dead pride. The jailer ripped a pull at her tresses and verged on slashing pieces off another end.

"Robbery is when those larger fish overtake beds of kelp from the deepsea yuugla. Surely you've partaken of or seen another variety of those delicacies, Princess of Octopon." The rapacious intruder unscrupulously persisted with a jeer. Jazhea swallowed a sickness and shook her head. "If you were in need of a hand from me, you could have spoken. How much less you must care about the sink of your Gem-flora and your Late-Vaecusa than the comfort from the first-mate who made profit off of their wounds and wasted screams. Don't think my payback is too harrying because you'll be the second to test the soakingscoo-scale from my...other nature." Jazhea heard an insidious howl and awed beneath a transforming shadow. Cold chills from her spine grazed with those dirty fingernails. His blade severed a scaly tail, it opened. With the extracting tongs Mantus displayed a palm-sized corpse of a hollowed spikefish, inside was a sea-leech with a set of needles underneath the tongue. With a disappointed sigh, he adjusted to sit on a steel barrel.

Xiluk's collapsed and lifeless trunk lay motionless beside ?her, a twitch of the breeze evoked his clammy forehead.

Joiquiva?" Jazhea did not trust the maiden before her.

"I'll make sure Lady Luck's deserving fortune comes from a plundering millionaire. This time your burden seals your tongue and breaks off your legs. How does it feel to have everything precious stolen from you?" Mantus simply sacked every last coin and barricaded the door on his abandonment of the shelter, walking out in fitting boots. The air ran just short of suffocating, one bell tolled.

On an island surrounded by the tone-sensitive boulders, a deviant creature emerged from obfuscous waves.

"Stop thief! Desist now!" Inside a temple, a being with flopped ears ordered. The advancing transgressor pushed away another guardian and would not cease his forward motion.

"Aaahaahaahahaha!" The deranged freak bellowed an insane guffaw. He aspired a struggling guard up by the throat and cast him into the wall with an oozing extremity, stealing from him a stringy tunning-fork.

"Protect the bell! Don't let him go free!" The captain of the monks screamed, the tentacle-armed hellion continued to stalk for the congregation and that which laid behind. The invader hurdled for the enormous bell, knocking out whoever had ventured to stand in the way.

"Stop him!" Kangent drastically thundered. He swung his own staff of power, but the zealot continued to move until he would have to cover his own flaps to shield from the horrendous noise. "No!" He jowled as he bolted forward. Too late.

"At long last, I am released once again!" The demonic gurgle burst from the forlorn backdrop. The ringing ceased as the monster spread stiff wings. He quaked into the air and shed a hateful mangle at the defenders.

"Now all hope is lost!" Kangent cried out. The red-eyed fiend gnashed, relieved and basking with rejuvenation.

"For the Dark Dweller!" The horrible fanatic spouted. "To Octopon!" He maniacally rasped, directing the servant beast to fly down on scaly wings and uplift the disciple.

"Yess!" The demon exuberantly hissed, mounting the shoulders of the black-blooded subhuman. He swooped through the roof, shattering the ornamental dome. The passenger lashed the handle of the instrument, loosening the sound stones from the route. Morpho disappeared as the dusky and portending occupants prepared for a tempest over Baanjamar. Kerroptus left only the splintered Bell of the First Sound in his second wake.

Upon the dreading shores of the land of echoes, the consolidation of the clergy gathered en masse.

"Kerroptus has been freed! Now what shall we do, sire?" Captain besought Kangent for an answer.

"The only thing we can do, rely on Ren. We will pray he finds a way to The Surge in some form before Kerroptus darkens the remaining Treasures of Rule." Kangent bid a pensive last command. listened throughout Mer.

Part ? Deals With The Devilfish

The tower above the lower-level was alive with activity. The building shone bright, packed with henchmen.

"You'll learn nothing from me, pirate!" The shrill of a garnet-haired matron asserted. She bit her lip, struggling in bonds to not let her determination die.

"I have ways of loosening your tongue!" The sinister voice of a spiteful pirate smoldered, he toted a grandiose and glimmering blade in his hand.

"You're wasting your time! The Treasures of Rule are a mystery! Not even I know what they do!" Jenna verbally fought, not giving in to the attacking swarm around her. She appeared worn, but her chide was still as feisty.

"You're going to tell us what you know!" Bloth boomed terribly once more, he glared down upon the lighthouse-keeper known as Jenna. He smacked the flat surface of the weapon against his hand like a rod. He fuse grew ever shorter by the day, somehow this woman who he assumed to be a stranger continued to resist cooperation. Yet he could tell she knew more than what she expressed.

"Bloth, me finally done!" The harried pant of an uneven walker scurried up the steps. "Wave need moving! Swing too wide!" He informed with a strained blast of sparse phrases. He was frank in his manner, but his lord did not seem at all pleased.

"Konk! Get back to work! You barnacle-rat of a snot-crusted...ninnyhammer!" The menacing Captain exploded with a flare of stress, he wrung up Konk into the air and shook him for a numerous spell before dropping the pestilence on the rump. The petite table that was stationed on the floor of the peak tier was relocated through the picture-window and outside.

"Ok Bloth, me go away!" Konk piddled and bludgeoned down the altitude. The mean overseer had been about to concern himself with just the thing the weakling reported until he was promptly persuaded to spin away when one of his other crew addressed him.

"Sir! The waves by the shore are becoming treacherous! We need orders where to take 'er!" The athletic grunt bolstered a gruff pitch from behind the Captain after having tromped up the burdensome stairs.

"By the abyss, not again!" Bloth growled as he began to storm off, not meagerly caring that Konk was correct in his estimate. "Mantus, watch the keeper and make sure she stays alive..." The cold and ragged order hung through the air. "And make sure our investment does not flee, or...Tula will be the replacement partner in your...Service." He swiftly added before he stomped down the stairwell. Mantus despairingly grimaced of anger, but nodded as he watched the departure. Breeze from outside tipped into the otherwise stuffy tier of the turret, following Bloth's redecoration.

Few moments passed before the leviathan-sized pillager disappeared and Mantus had been left standing with his scimitar drawn over the ruby-locked female who was lashed to a post. The men in the top floor of the lighthouse started to get rowdy.

"So can we kill her now, boss?" One stupid pirate asked.

"No! You smool-brained cretin! Bloth wants the hag alive!" Mantus viciously snarled, impatiently full of gall and spite as he was ready to stroke his sword at the offending underling. His boss had picked the scourge of Octopon for a crew, senselessly raiding and killing had been all these clowns wished to do. He needed to maintain control, and he was not in a very good mood. Time elapsed and nothing compelling had been brought to focus.

"Mantus, Mantus! What I do now?" The haggard defrauder grudgingly curved to the stumbling pegleg, who had made his way up the stairs and was calling out to him.

"Swab the deck!" Mantus impatiently roared, stabbing frost at the groveling tub-of-lard.

"But Mantus, me swab deck already! Three times today!" Konk logically complained of the obviously nonsensical order.

"Then swab it a forth, maggot-pig!" The commander shattered out. He threw a bucket at the piglet who was making his job harder, and caused him to topple over. The fat man ran off. He paced away and returned with a mug, glugging the contents. "What are you all staring at?!" He fumed as he lashed down one of the empty barrels in the room with a stern leg.

"Hey! Where did Mantus get something to drink?" One of the crew pestered, envying the exquisite amber of the brew.

"Aye! Give us some kleepa-juice!" Another rambunctious man persisted.

"No distractions, you filthy toads! If the keeper doesn't spill, there is no recompense for any of us!" Mantus haughtily lashed at the serfs.

"You're drinking it! Mantus, we've been up here for days with nothing to do and it's like a jitatan Ruukaana-Oven up here! Give us ale to quench our thirst, yha stingy mudslinger! We're bored!" One bandit in the room excitedly demanded.

"Aye, yer stale!" More uproarious riles ensued soon after from the aggressive band of high-seas brigands Mantus was responsible for.

"We'd all have leave if you'd do your taks right!" The supervisor snarled with an impetuous combativeness, he wiped his mouth. The uprising quelled but stewed with whispers. Mantus was aware Octopon had grown, but was still a broken city. It's population was few and far between, but there were still abundant places to exploit. He was dead here.

"Boss, don't you think we should maybe give Konk something else to do besides maid work?" One of the more intelligent crewmen questioned orders.

"I don't have orders!" Mantus stated harshly. "Get back to work!" He barked, yet another flunky then conferred with him.

"Sir, the Captain wants to talk to you!" The subordinate marauder beckoned from the stairs.

"Noy jitat!" Mantus cursed under his breath, he violently smashed the glass on the floor. "I'm coming!" He pitifully shouted out with a squealing pitch, and he inclined to the crew before he shot down the stairs. "If the keeper is dead or escaped by the time I come back you're all getting thrown to dark water!" The skeletal pirate ruthlessly threatened his charge and left. By the time he was gone, the hidden cache of kleepa had been passed around and cut into.

The medium-sized frigate steadily rocked as the Captain paced back and forth. The ship weathered a chubby man who was brandishing a mop and staying out of the way.

"Wave ain't no name for ship. Me think Bloth run out of good ship names." Konk mumbled on as he soaked his squeegee and wiped the floorboards beneath him. He saw an intimidating eye bat in his direction and he promptly became silent. His eyes shifted and witnessed Mantus climb aboard from the narrow landstrip.

"Good Mantus, you're here. What did you learn?" The revolting Captain of the stolen ship solicited.

"Nothing, Milord. Ioz told the dagron-wench to shove off. She never boasted to Ren any clues and the keeper won't say a word no matter what we do!" Mantus brought the unfortunate news, Bloth displayed a ferocious conduct.

"Well she better talk soon! I can't elude that old woman with the fleet indefinitely! I need to find the secret of the Treasures of Rule, quickly!" Bloth applied with urgent and demanding words, he shook the second-in-command as if he was trying to compel his motivator to sink in to the skull of the faint-hearted lackey. "Mer should already be in my clutches by now..." He droned with a resentful and untamed growl. The pursuit of maneuvers through conquest was for some reason, not working. His face twisted into an incarnation of seething rage, thinking of that blond-haired-foe of his, who had somehow managed to hold him up.

"The last time I was there, the Plant was leading the old fool to the Eastern shores!" Mantus squeezed out, unconcealed nervousness spurting. Bloth pondered this for a frugal moment. "Bloth, we can't administer thumbbites on the keeper, there's not enough resources! Ren has been captured, Operation Monkeybird Espionage is aborted!" Mantus lurched out the obvious snafu in the order of procedure.

"Operation Monkeybird Airlift, isn't." The avian of cloying charm suggested with a grin.

"Very well!" The Pirate Lord snarled. "Go! Buy us more time, away with one of you insects!" Bloth issued the order as he marked chaotically at both his surviving men from the Maelstrom wreck.

"I'm not carrying that fat-runt any distance!" The choosy monkeybird on the Captain's shoulder indignantly affirmed, sneering at Konk. The piglet shot a return glare.

"Konk don't like monkeybirds." Konk grumbled under his breath until Bloth pointed a threatening iris of yellow at him.

"Mantus!" The Captain brashly directed him, tearing a glance.

"Move, Yellow-Wing!" The swordsman yelled out a command as the simian bird flew to his shoulders to lift him off into the night sky.

"Konk!" The lord of the ship hollered sharply. "Go to the lighthouse, make sure that jitatan lighthouse-keeper doesn't escape!" He ordered the runt, pointing to the tower.

"Yes boss!" Konk cheerfully obliged and almost smiled. "Finally!" He groaned with relief and tossed the wooden pole of the mop across the planks, breaking for the lighthouse.

"Bring me the bones of Lady Luck's heel and I will accomplish your course." Over the girdle of cold ocean, a pair of rippling eyes of fire communed with the solitary Captain. The vision was reflected in the form of a magic illusion on the surface of Octopon's brackish, a dancing moth with burning spots. The voice inflamed of a choked roar from a distorted face. The Eyes of the Fallen Captain aspired to the zenith of a screaming sky as an Octopian warship became overwhelmed by water-lash, and the sailors shared their last ahoys.

"Of course, perhaps this is our only hope. I do not have forever to regain my ship, friend of Teron." Bloth pondered his irritation about the apparent delightful news and lifted an uncomfortable brow at the questionable source.

"Drown, Octopian vermin. In the name of my Beautiful." Shrouded behind a near mast, a veiled magician took a bow. Like a puppeteer, the aquatic projection ceased after the warlock with no identity lowered his enchanting hands.

The area East of the city of Octopon was teeming with various watercraft. Many Merrians abounded along the shore where they had been stationed.

"You mean to tell me he is making toward the Meridol shore now?" The white-haired authority exclaimed with pernicious disbelief. Behind her assembled a melting-pot of warriors from all the distant parts of the world.

"Yes, ma'am! I fear the worst! Bloth took him to the shoreline! Perhaps even to the mountain chain itself!" The tan-blooded witness, who bore more of an uncanny semblance to a pirate than a citizen flailed out in a too-real hyperbole.

The elder scouted about with several men and woman, with or without beasts and carrying swords among other weapons behind her. She bent back to the meager stranger. "Can you take us there?" Avagon narrowed her aged eyes, coveting some detail. "Do you not know the exact location?" She interrogated of the hectic and exaggerating chap below her.

"No ma'am. I'm sorry, but I can show'ya to where I saw him taken!" The loud sailor proclaimed.

"Very well." Avagon agreed with the utmost urgency. "Company!" She instructed the troops of Merrians behind her. "Stay at shore! Should anything happen, Loren is in charge!" She dispelled the order as the loyalist from a pinnace within the navel formation nodded his head. The dowager and her immediate guardians prepared themselves for battle as they followed the agitated attester.

Soon would slide to much later when Mantus and Yellow-Wing would come down for a landing. The proxy and his transport were greeted by a buccaneer who bore similar anatomy to the one who lured the matriarch.

"Commander Mantus, Sir!" The peon greeted the ethereal taskmaster with a salute. He watched the pair of figures touch down in the area, only far enough away from a massive armada of ships.

"Well?" Mantus's glacial and hoarse bid awaited the subordinate, a pause briefly followed so he applied his call again. "How is the diversion going?" He crassly pressed for the rundown.

"It is going well, Sir. Hazo guided the hag away as planned, everything should go smoothly unless she gets attacked or catches on!" The pirate minion bowed and reported his findings to the commander, a trace of a sweat-bead lining his temple.

"Very well." Mantus cordially responded with searing coolness. "Lord Bloth will be pleased to hear this." The slick consort calmly proceeded. He turned his back to survey the fleet as his audience dislodged an alleviated sigh. "Word on Ioz?" He doubtlessly hunted for a hint.

"Ioz, aye I've seen him. Dusky fellow with the topknot right, paranoid like he's being watched over the shoulder all the time? Loves kleepa-ale in taverns...playing reef-roll, and kinda rough with them females?" Mantus curled with an interested glare, his maw slightly creaked.

"Where was he?" The con leader disturbingly froze and his broad eyes darted.

"Around this place, passed on the horizon when I was looking for me hat. He kept a lady in pink with him too. That Ioz, I watched him in a tavern once. He was grogging on 'his own and chewing on the wiles of 'sea-life and then all these women just smothered him like he were Kuunda in-the-flesh, all in less than one turn of the table. Get this...he didn't even need to pay a single one of them, they were so enamored with him and said he was a good lover. I'd love to be in his shoes, that one lucky-son-of-sea-dog-ladies'man..." The blabing whelp recounted to insidious length, and further panged Mantus to boil over with displeasure.

"The seas of smool-brains like he were always at my back, even before I lost my fatherland's favor. I will take out Ioz, with my own blade." Mantus icily frowned and unsheathed his blade, slicing through the stiff brush in one fell swoop.

"Does that mean I won't be thrown into dark water, Sir?" The underling conjured an optimistic will as he nervously gulped. To his misfortune, the commander's reply was not as comforting as he would have hoped.

"If you don't mess up!" Mantus hinted with a gruff lowness, shooting the inferior shipman a chilling glare as Yellow-Wing rushed the administrator off in the direction they had come.

"Wait, Yellow-Wing." In flight midway, Mantus urged. "Down." He worded a quick phrase, seeing a curious exhibit below. His boots established back down on the dirt. "Stay here." He staunchly exhorted, the monkeybird had done what he asked without contention. Mantus hiked forward to be received by a peculiar sight, a man in a chair that was attached to an ingenious apparatus. By the side of the stationary fellow were two more, one short and the other behemoth.

"Mantus, my shady tradesman and honorary Brother of Market, what brings you to my humble home in West-Meridol?" The host eagerly welcomed, providing a spread on a platter closeby. The main proprietor sought to entertain, but his guest shook an oblong head.

"Business." Mantus denoted with a flinty word at the reciprocal understanding of his associate. "As good as our Trade has been to us, do you want your empire back?" The insidious commander propositioned. The listener wrought an aware but skeptical glance.

"It's hard to rule wings when you don't have use of your legs. My good man, how do you intend to help me?" The identity bound to the contraption pondered from the known ally as he ran a finger under his scabrous chin.

"My employer will need some assistance starting up. We have a few of your feathered-friends but in exchange, I want something from you." Mantus returned his conniving proposal.

"Dagrons?" Jargis knowingly shifted a leery glance, the offer could be arduous.

"Only two. Tula, to appease Bloth. Jazhea, Daughter of Primus, still breathing and under my lock. Bloth only needs her for Ren, but I'd prefer insurance on the Princess of Octopon. I'll make an additional bid for my stingy thief, my influence and my rank with Bloth." The crook made a simple intention known.

"And for Niddler and Yellow-Wing?" Jargis straightly vocalized the clean deal.

"That's the maneuver. Got it? Make sure they don't escape, you know I have my orders on all things property." Mantus presented while pointing a dirty eye, he grinned with an undertone.

"The deal has been made, Mantus." Jargis clapped his hands as he and the commander agreed to terms, finishing their debauchery and sharing in a glass of fine ale. Smiles were exchanged and hands shook, both parties walking away perceptively pleased.

The downy individual soared into a nook where the evasive consultant pitched for. Mantus shuffled into a secret bunker. Filled inside the ascending walls were ports for mooring sharkemsubs, the submersible vehicles. In the very epicenter settled an astronomic mountain of gold, the widest and the heaviest of any. "Bloth's treasury. All 999,999,999 pieces." Mantus snickered to Yellow-Wing, casting a brisk peek before he plowed in spine-first to lounge against the glowing mound.

"So Bloth will sell you the Maelstrom once he becomes a billionaire? Seems very uncanny for a guy like him." Yellow-Wing stretched his claws as Mantus gleefully resumed a springy posture to pluck a single speck of fortune from the collection.

"Not only that, but these passages under Octopon's temples all connect to every historic compound owned by the House of Primus. His stockpile from the Valjen raids and every plundered dory is all here. No one will find, or dare enter the halls to the abandoned palace marked by the nefarious Z.M.Q., Bloth would have it that way." The bladesman marched out through a loading dock in the underground chapel. Shining the single drabul for luck, he lingered in displaying the keepsake. "The sacred Protectors of the North, surely give me this blessing on the day I will cheat the Pirate King with his own Treasure. After all, 999,999,999 only makes One less than One billion." He stowed the gilded bounty underneath his trimmed raiment as he lusted. Yellow-Wing ogled the primeval architecture as Mantus led a circling egress to a grassy turf.

"You're a jetsam-slime, Mantus, true and true. You are such a smart shardfish, but I think it would be safer to just pay him the one drabul of your gold instead of putting it on a bet of chance and swindling Bloth with one coin of his own bounty." The sun-furred monkeybird plopped his derriere upon the hillside, granting him a fine view of what could be seen of the waning sunset. Ever promptly, blankets of apocalyptic clouds shielded the life-giving orb.

"This is how investments are made, wing-slug. You know Yellow-Wing, you're the closest thing to a true 'mate I've had since joining Bloth." The devious cutthroat angelically sneered, diverting to sit next to his peer for a temporal break. He pulled the gleaming ally into an embrace of brethren.

"Aww, you mean that?" The bi-colored monkeybird smoothly crooned.

"No wealth can replace my main pair of wings, and no ship comes between a pirate and his monkeybird." The sleek villain buoyantly commended as he shared his mug with the delighted and sincere primate. "At sun up, we show every man carnage and every pretty piece of gold and booty our blades of subjection." With an ample oath of annihilation, he declared his certain venom.

"You dirty old windbag-of-a-seadog, your heart is cold like bars of solid gold! Of course the real reason we're doing this is just for pleasure, to full skies of yellow plumage!" Yellow-Wing cheered with a feathery shoulder-bump and a successful squawk. When Mantus faced the Eastern horizon where smoke hung in heated waves, he lunged to the inferior side of a hill.

"Watch our Sharkemsub." Mantus furthered into the tropical land, away from the vicinity of Jargis's hutch and Yellow-Wing. He annexed upon a stationary inland stream and signaled with a raised arm for an oceanic creature to surface to his beckon. The commodious shark cracked a mouth full of razor teeth and allowed the implacable agent to step inside. The maw snapped shut and Mantus popped his shoulders into the transparent dome of the vehicle's skull. Guiding with the controls to the fins of the beasts, he debarked underwater and reemerged upon a steep canyon. There he trekked forward and witnessed a league of former guardians of Jargis's reign that were gathered for him.

"Liege Mizzen Conquest, Sir!" The lead cadet bowed with a formal hail of obedience. "What is our next order of operation, Miliege?" The captain of the brigade sought on bended knee. The ranks behind him were clothed in full-bodied bonemail and skull-armored helmets wrapped tight on napes of gangling hair. Spikes on their shins mounted upon giant lava-gorged-blobs that bore the roundness of an amphecyte but the composition of a sea-snail, on the brims of the mollusks were feathered wings and each steed wore a pouting frown.

"Operation Tidal Wave is go! No quarter for able-bodied Magmatates!" Mantus vigorously commanded under the swing of his filthy mane and a sordid hand-motion, to which the forty-nine men and one woman of the patrol exchanged disheveled glares. Reotozz grinned with fever.

"Sir!" The staid forces of the presiding officer revered and obliged with a salute and preempted into the sky upon the backs of the magma cretins. The waves of volcanic imps dotted the astral beyond, granting the slate clouds over the cliff a splotching of sanguinary shadow.

"Go! My proud legions of the Securitat! Spread cruelty wherever you plunder!" Mantus threw up his arms into the breeze, blood pumping with steel and brimstone as he manically gloried in the dispersing tornado of his own slaughtering platoon. The fiendish Commander cackled destructively as the crimson speckles shuffled out of his view. He retreated to his vehicle.

"Llorg, Slaggon, my most loyal attendants and brothers, I'll pay you both manifold when I get my empire back. Then I will no longer have to live off my life savings." Underneath the skies, the fallen tyrant laughed corruptly. "Those wingless monkeybirds will experience what it's like to be thrown off a cliff! Go!" Jargis excitedly cried out. He launched into the air on his flying chair as Slaggon directed the glider over his head, the brutal Llorg pedaling at the tail of the invention.

Only a insignificant reach away, a reedy entity summoned forth a sunny assistant with a Pandaawa Screaming-Clam. The aerial aide dispatched and slid to a decline at the personal invite. Mantus donned a helmet and protective bonemail fashioned out of a volcanic warrior's ribcage. He granted Yellow-Wing the lighter flight-armor and prepared to lift out where streaks of heat burned through shallow vapor.

"Let's go, Yellow-Wing." Mantus returned to his position of dock, inciting to go. Yellow-Wing took off presently after.

"Did you recruit more volunteers for us?" The monkeybird questioned from above ground.

"Of course. How would you like to be second-in-command, Yellow-Wing?" Mantus inquired with a quiet audacity.

The striped avian snickered. "I'd love to! Wait, aren't you?" Yellow-Wing puzzled at a bizarre contradiction in the commander's words.

"The challenge for power is the most important when there are two for second place, but for my Yellow-Wing, we can always rig the contest. I need only to buy enough kutlack and obtain enough leviathan bones to rebuild my arsenal on the Mizzen Conquest, because, Maelstrom is a Kuunda-curse when it can sink in a maelstrom." The cunning commander noted his exacting scheme to the clueless flyer.

"You're thinking ahead!" Yellow-Wing gasped with a beauteous appraisal.

"Yes. Get used to this, Yellow-Wing. You will enjoy much more in the future, my Order will have little use for Pandaawa when only one man can advance the conception of the New fairer-kind. He will reign not only as the Pirate King, but as Zuuror Mantus of the Qui-Qua Empire forevermore." Mantus craftily articulated, hopping a migrant dagron soon as it passed. "Now, Mer will be mine." Saying a disgraceful phrase, he sailed off with the avaricious hybrid.

"We'll both spread the wings of conquest to enrich foreign shores, yes? I applaud this idea, very much so. Regretfully, my pickings are conclusively limited." The monkeybird's obscene remark faded into the heavens.

The dank corner of an unknown place filled with noise and motion as a door creaked open. Light edged in. The hulking shape entered the room and focused on the unwell and dismayed yellow-hair, who was shackled to the South wall. The desperate adolescent immediately stopped grating the unforgiving cuffs against the stone block. Weary and penetrating eyes of blue met the frightening gaze.

"Ready to talk, Son of Primus?" The cruel query of the spacious evil-one gracefully craved answer.

"I'll tell you nothing, Bloth! Especially about the Treasures of Rule, and nothing you can do will ever make me!" Ren valiantly held on, not willing to give into the enemy at any threat. His unfortunate arch-nemesis had not yet figured out how to take over. Ren would not help him with this, even at the promise of a miserable eternity. He curled his head away, not desiring to grant the oppressing form so much as a peek.

The heartless instigator laughed for a few moments and then spoke in an infernally calm and serious tone. "I thought just as much, but I have ways of making you squirm, Ren. Why waste prime energy on attacking you with something that won't harm you, when I can raze you with the very place you're vulnerable." Bloth's sinister and nipping cackle furthermore piqued.

Ren's glimmer of ice flashed. Bloth would not be able to surmount him, but something about the way he was talking could give him the shivers. "What is that supposed to mean?" The unsettled prince retorted.

To the boy's horror, the monstrous pirate rendered a miniature frame that Ren instantly recognized. "Ahh, the King of Octopon during his Coronation years, mind telling me who these people are beside him, Son of Primus?" His creepy and placid requisition again pressed as the hideous ruler extended a photograph of the Royal family from Ren's homeland in front of the trembling face of the lad.

"No...are you done, trying to use it against me?!" Ren denied the fact and attempted to settle his contorting stomach, but he failed. "Let me out now, you spineless kreld-eater! You can't possibly go this vicious, naja-dog..." He visibly stuttered with enmity, one affright expression of revulsion parted his lips. He trawled for how the thief could have secured a hold on it, then he remembered that he was captured. That was what happened. Again he felt anguished.

"I made short gruel of so many in this picture, fond memories." Bloth's drivel was sickeningly sweet, a crooked smile on chasmal lips met Ren's eyes. "That woman at the lighthouse is related to you, isn't she? She's not your mother, I remember personally dispatching her. Dear Aunt, perhaps? It would be such a shame, should something happen to your Father's...servant. Say, sinking to the bottom of the ocean." The hidden daggers in his words stabbed the ears of the youthful regal. Ren shuddered and was unable to prevent a grisly queasiness from fostering in his throat. "I recognize your sister. I haven't given her a personal greeting but my good man, Mantus, seems quite taken to be the New king of Octopon. Jazhea did well to persuade you in attire from after your Father's decade, made possible by a Ten-Years' Spell. Notice the dress she wore when she greeted you in Janda-town? Thank Morpho for that." He concluded with a rumbling taunt.

"Ah-huh? What, Bloth?" Ren blinked with a faltering groan, genuinely

"I guess jewelry-trading is too far up the mast for a good boy. Blargg. Perhaps I will take care of Teron, I no longer have need of him, that old rind of a haggard is washed to shore as an ecomancer." Bloth's deleterious inflection became one of ponder, as if he were trying to truthfully decide some whim. "It's too bad, that you won't get to say goodbye to any of them." The vicious overlord smiled, frigid amber piercing into his target.

"Spare your threats, Bloth. I don't know the facts you're after and I won't tell you anything, no matter who you vilify. No one you mentioned would ever want me to put the world in danger so they could live!" Ren couldn't hamper his imminent fury, he unconsciously slanted his twitching eyeline and he did not realize how many of his shortcomings were showing.

"By my Soul, Ren, I'm sure Jenna will be pressing on her feet when I say Hello for you. She's held up painstakingly well under the pressures of my Crew." The unrelenting brute continued to harass as the squinting Ren only cemented his head from what he perceived viewable and grit his teeth. "So the mere mention of his kin is all it takes to break the fearless Prince of Octopon. I don't know why I didn't do this sooner!" Bloth empowered a bogging slew through his blood by a wicked laugh. In another foul action, he stomped on the only remaining shred of the group of regents. Ren prayed to Kuunda this would be over.

Ren's heart sunk. He would utter a thousand curses in this moment if he knew it would benefit his position at all. It wouldn't. He flinched with a ghastly sorrow, eyes cast down.

Not being able to protect the ones he cared about most or even knowing what was going on outside, that was the worst torture the crying teen could imagine. It didn't make a difference though, he couldn't save them. Even if he told Bloth anything he knew about the Treasures, they still may be killed by him. This was the one time he couldn't muster the strength to say anything at all. He coiled his head away, easement would at last come now.

Bloth, as if sensing Ren's despair, ruined the quietude again. "Oh, Son of Primus." ushered with a blithe rhythm. There was a glint that lit up in his sentient eye. "Do you remember how you were captured with your feathered-friend?" The barbarous jailer asked as Ren's beaten glance hurled up to meet his, he laughed. "Would you like to know what happened to him?" His poison-lined prominence teased, and he did not wait for the prince to react. The collection of reddish-yellow and aqua feathers floated to the ground.

"No..." Ren shook with emotion, regrets swallowing in every shred. His eyes were focused on the colorful plumage that dropped to the ground. He heard his unscrupulous foe leave through the door and lock it behind him. His blurring eyes squinted. He wouldn't allow it to happen but yet, it was. "Niddler...no." He said the last thing he would permit in the now deadening darkness.

Part ? Moon Wave

Far off from Octopon, two korba-cats were making way Southbound from a minor island.

"Ioz, I don't like it. He could still be out there somewhere. Anywhere." In a drained hum, Tula trembled to the outlaw flying on the parallel hybrid. She would remain badly concerned about her friend who had not returned, even after days of waiting. It was Ioz's decision when they finally left Takrar-town on the third sunrise after he was expected to arrive.

"He would've come back by now. He could only have been taken to one place." Ioz ardently maintained. "We know that kreld-eater needs to be at the lighthouse before he can do anything." He muttered lowly, eying the dismal and overcast plane. He suspended in speech as if thinking deeply. Mer was unchanged. "We know he's still alive." He murmured the truth about their crewmate, the one that very few would know.

"I don't want to think about what Bloth will do to him." Tula's voice almost broke. "He hates Ren more than anyone in the twenty seas! And Niddler..." Her face seemed as if it were about to be consumed with an upset, Ioz finally glimpsed at her with his own purposeful and piceous eyes. She settled with a bitter hunch.

"Be strong, Tula. We'll find them both, I swear on my father's sword." Ioz appeared to be distant and intense as strong emotion was creeping into his own wind. Silence followed the man through the air.

"You know I've been wondering, where exactly did that Amulet you're wearing come from? Jazhea seemed to be very insistent that it belonged to her, even Mantus said it. If he and Bloth hadn't stolen the 12th Treasure of Rule from us, I'd be inclined to trust him." Tula motioned to the baffling pendant dangling from the buccaneer's neck.

"Everyone wants to know, right, Tula? This was given to me by a sea-woman I used to know, she told me it would protect me from danger...of course it never worked. I wore it, for her. I thought she was taken by the sea and lost forever. Mantus knew it, he knew it was given to me by a lass, but he never knew who. If he ever did find out, I would have to sell my jitatan skin to Bloth to keep the jewelry-leech away. I don't know how well Jazhea's precious necklace looks like mine but the only Amulet he spoke of is this, and it is authentic." Ioz morbidly told an unnatural tale from memory. He touched the orb of metallic green that was fastened by a golden chain.

"Mantus was thrown to the Constrictus for the escape of one of Bloth's prisoners, but it wasn't until Ren sea-bummed me into joining his Quest I found out he survived...for some reason." Ioz tried to explain, but his concept came from being too vague to tell what was almost forgotten himself.

"How do you know that Bloth killed him, or even tried to?" Tula couldn't hide doubt of a sick feeling, even from the loyalest of her peers.

"I don't. Like I've said, I was fleeing in the ocean with Zoolie and saw his dangling legs after we jumped overboard during that deck-fire. Only that bilge-speaking witch may have seen what happened to him back then." Ioz confided among an uncomfortable blink.

"Are you trying to say it was Jazhea?" Tula tangled on the owner of the Amulet, and whether it was who they were talking of.

"No. Her flower-speaking friend, some kind of witch under that cloak. Whatever her name and whoever she is, she sort of helped Zoolie and I from drowning our necks but we didn't see it all. I doubt Zoolie and I would be so close, if that chungo-lungo knew what I had seen before the insect was praying to the white fist. The wrath of Bloth is Mantus's disaster to foul, not mine." The empath tried to put her clues in perspective, but Ioz was unclear on too many details.

"I don't understand how he could recover so quickly. If he lost everything and he somehow found a way to reach Ren, does that make him more dangerous than before?" Tula analyzed ponderously, coming to terms with her lack of insight. The gliding feline gnarled, and she compassionately stroked upon fur.

"Not entirely, resourceful maybe. Surely he's been around the globe as many times as they say. He'll steal a ship as quickly as I stole the Wraith. Ahem, Bloth and his crony have rather...unethical methods of picking a crew. He wants willing volunteers, they're easier to control when they have no where else to go. This is the fact, Tula, I'm amazed we've dodged Bloth for as long as we have. By Kuunda I made sure the hold was clear when we set sail for Aymara, but we were still wrecked in dark water. While I'll bet Bloth is engrossed in scheming against his enemies, Yellow-Wing is sneakier than the average monkeybird." Ioz discoursed with rigidity.

"Unethical? Tell me." Tula stuck to the opening word, insistent on an anecdote.

"He and that darva-rat don't have any problems finding new recruits in the Janda-town Jewelry Market. He doesn't always find them mundane like in some ways. Mantus knows crews will throw a lot more weight on their shoulders for one woman than they will for one man overboard. Coming or going doesn't matter, in their regard." The experienced seafarer carelessly explained something, but soon regretted his wording.

"What does that mean? He buys jewelry? I thought Mantus was only interested in being rich." Tula questioned the particular phrase.

"Just stay away from him, he's not much different from Bloth." Ioz privily dodged the empath's curiosity.

"Why? If Bloth has Ren, won't he be there as well?" Tula persisted crisply. Because she did not seem willing to relent, Ioz caved.

"Bloth and Mantus run a tight ship, woman. Mantus is rather...unkind, and when you see him in action...Believe me when I say, Tula, that you don't want to know what happens. My drabul-philandering ways do not even begin to describe his, and he's prime of the roughest marauders of deep waters. There is a difference between myself and Mantus...I steal gold because I'm a cheat. Mantus steals jewelry...because he owns everything with any value. You know that Mer will always be a man's world, but Qui-Qua has never bowed to a Queen." Ioz went no further. Tula harmoniously sighed, not in the spirit to bicker uselessly about the disparity between them. Whatever he was hiding, he seemed to be covering it too well for her to heedfully pick up on.

"We won't be able to take him on without weapons, and the only towns are far from here." Tula said of other thoughts. It was fortunate there had been a woman who owned a korba-cat ranch on the island, who unfortunately found herself involved with a loan and a trick from Ioz. Somehow, all their gold save for Ioz's three had found a route off the Wraith, including the bundle given by Jazhea. There would be no stopping on the way there, though they would not anyway.

"We'll just have to use our wits and improvise, it's all we can do." With a steel nerve, Ioz proclaimed their only viable course of action. The wild cat he drove reeled in a swoop and suddenly, collided with something. "Chungo lungo!" He released his guff with surprise. His eyes were stunned when he saw what he had hit. "Jitatan monkeybirds!" Ioz was astounded. He swung his head and watched a heavy swarm of feathered primates, all around him and all fluttering in the same way they were.

"Amazing!" Tula positively cheered, her head perked up. She had never seen anything like this before. "Where do you think they're going?" She called over to her companion on the feral beast next to her.

"Don't know, looks like they're going the same direction we are!" The broad-muscled fellow shouted back to her.

"Maybe I can ask!" Tula yelled back. She swerved to the flock to get their attention. "Where are you all going?" She sympathetically hollered abound as loud as she could, hand siding her cheek. She heard many responses, all flitting back at the same time.

"Octopon! Octopon!" The monkeybirds cawed. Tula had been about to ask why when she listened to the same union of cascading hues calling again. "We're going to save our world! There's nowhere left for us to go anymore!" The monkeybirds screeched their ambition, some sounded brave. Others seemed worried or sad and some even appeared to be happy. It was truly an amazing sight to behold. The travelers were not sure from where the colony had come, but they knew they were with good company. Tula even saw a hint of a smile grace her mouth. Vibrant feathers from the airways formed a fascinating rainbow in the contrastingly bleak sky. For once since they had found the 12th Treasure, there was a glimmer of hope.

"Have you seen Ren?" The wondering ecomancer sought with an unyielding outcry, eager for the chance Ren whereabouts would be known and moreso aware of it being possibly the only hint she would be able to strive for.

"Son of Primus is in Octopon! Octopon!" All the monkeybirds hooted. This certainly was not very descriptive. Tula had given up hope on hearing about any exact location when she hearkened a caw that streamed against the grain in the sea of monkeybirds.

"The lighthouse!" It beaconed with confirmation. Tula and Ioz breathlessly gasped when they browsed to the source of the voice and spotted a scarlet flash glissading close to the side.

"Niddler!" Tula lit up from her stupor with exalted eyes.

"Bloth is at the lighthouse!" Niddler shrieked back. Various feathers were notably missing from his wings, but he was still able to fly.

"Where's Ren?" Tula hustled in acknowledgment, she did not receive a reply at first.

"Blue-lips didn't even grant me a visit, but if he did I would have plucked out his remaining eye for what he did to Ren!" Niddler squawked in return, sounding regrettably flustered. It seemed as if there were things he did not want to talk about, Tula did not pry over how he lost his plumage.

"Noy jitat! What did he do?!" Ioz hollered awfully, feeling panic starting to rise in his chest.

"I just know he's in bad condition, Fish-lips did something to sabotage him and then carted him off somewhere!" Niddler formed a bunch of noises as he sounded the most angry the two of them had ever heard. He was keeping the current just beside them.

"Niddler come here!" Tula endearingly summoned as Niddler drew close. She signaled for him to land on the chimera, which he did. The longing monkeybird and the ecomancer shared in a feathery hug as the two aerial steeds and the winged flock continued on.

"Artifice! Father!" The dexterous avian spotted a broad wing-span of rich burgundy passing below.

"Don't tell me you're surprised to see me, son." Artifice's resolve prompted a colorful streak from the dust. Three travelers nodded in respect for the tailless monkeybird and the shimmer of his rainbow wing-guards.

Outside the lighthouse, a moderately capacious frigate was pulling into the harbor closeby. The ship veered to an abrupt stop as an abnormally lofty and tufted shape touched down on the deck.

"Lord Bloth!" Hailed the tall figure. Some of the height had since dissolved from him as a fluttering creature departed from his outline. "The diversion is still in place!" The guttural servant reported to an intimidating and manifold form on the craft, who was in the midst of stroking a sable beard.

"Good, good. Then it's going better than trying to extract information from that lowly brat." Bloth's loathsome antipathy carried a parlous forecast through the air.

"What now shall I do, Milord?" Mantus sought with composure.

"You can go to the lighthouse, relieve Konk of his duty." The disastrous Captain grumbled.

"Yes Milord." Mantus quietly obliged, bowing as Yellow-Wing again mounted his shoulders and airily rustled to the lighthouse. The attendants entered through the opened pane.

Away at an adequate distance, two fearsome cats reached the berm of the seaboard. The riders of the twin beasts watched in trepidation as the lean ruffian crossed into the broken glass and settled inside.

"So are you sure we're ready? What if Yellow-Wing is in there..." Niddler gulped as he folded patches of his down. "He's more dangerous than he looks..." He hesitated rummaging further for woe of disfigurement.

"Do you need my advice on on Yellow-Wing, son?" Artifice offered a short idea, he brushed his copper beard with firm finger-pads.

"That would be helpful." The cowardly flier shook and coughed, wishing he had feigned ill.

"Yellow-Wing is a careless planner, for him defeat is simple as telling him his faults. When in doubt, Mother always knows best." The paternal Artifice's feedback did not grant a fair reassurance. "Do not fear, Niddler. I have not seen such a monkeybird worthy of honor since Jargis himself took my tail when I was Commander of Pandaawa's Airforce Division in the Aymara Rebellion, I earned those colors with these wings. I'll scout for Bloth." The veteran lifted his bold wings to take off among the coarse wind.

"It's good to have him helping us with our fight, Niddler. Queen Aysha said Artifice is the cleverest monkeybird all in things, besides her Majesty's own judgment of course." Tula yearned to encourage Niddler from his dolor spirit.

"I love my Mother, too. No one is going to help me...I'll never have my chance to nest with the Future Mother of Us All..." Niddler sulked in weariness, defeat was not easy as his standing father would consider.

"Let's go!" The robust pirate next to a rosy ecomancer charged. "Even if we're outnumbered, we have to try. For Ren!" Ioz ruggedly vowed with every iota evoked for ambush, focusing on Tula as she nodded. The teammate duo escalated the spiral staircase of the tower, the monkeybird following behind. Breaths were drawn in haste.

When the two shipmates attained the top floor, they scoped the forthcoming distress. About fifteen grinning and ruggedly-built pirates, as well as the gaunt commander and the sneering pegleg, awaited them. The duplicitous monkeybird-foe was perched on the swordman's shoulders. The claret-haired keeper of the lighthouse was tied up around a pillar inside the terrace. All eyes in the room shot at the trespassers as they became visible.

"Haha! Look Mantus! It Ioz and Tula!" The one-legged ignoramus humorously chortled, he spit on the floor with vehemency. "Does Bloth want them captured?" Konk consulted the gangling guard next to him.

"Of course he does!" Mantus's scathing prerogative fired back. "Attack and restrain them!" He pointed to the objective with his slasher, ordering at the minions in the lighthouse. He snickered, amused at the sight of the unarmed heroes.

"Save yourselves!" Jenna alarmed from the post, soon silenced by the warriors around her. Men were starting to pour toward the intruders.

"Ioz, he has Jenna! What will we do?" Tula desperately called for a plan.

"Run!" Ioz's shouted response was simple. He ducked out of the way of several swords waving at him and he managed to tumble out from their beings, tripping some of the goons. He detected an approaching meathead coming toward him and knocked the attacker off footing with a one-hand punch to the head. "I didn't think that kreld-eater would manage to recruit a jitatan army of dock-vermin this quickly...Noy jitat. I don't think this is all of them either!" He inhaled his breath as he spotted Tula attempting to fend off a handful of henchmen herself. "Chungo lungo! Hold on!" He speedily hollered. Konk was emerging from behind his back with a cleaver.

Tula was on the floor when she had just enacted to roll away from a striking raider. Rocking with both her legs, she kicked away one more. She garnered to her feet, only until she was bashed down again. "Ioz!" She scrambled to warn her friend of the impending danger.

Ioz zipped around at Tula's alert and grabbed the piglet by his organic leg, swinging him to subsequently mow down assorted others. He dropped his catch and saw that Konk was hurrying down the stairs. He stretched for Tula, who was now in a tight spot and lifted her up to carry. Hooligans were still coming toward him and he proceeded to spin out of the way and clip a few over but almost lost his balance under the weight of another. Niddler swooped overhead and attempted to boost them both up and away.

"Not so fast, feather-head!" Yellow-Wing furiously squawked and darted at Niddler, scratching and persevering to pluck the feathers of the rival bird. The pair of them screeched and feuded until Niddler had been forced to liberate Ioz and Tula. With a grin, Yellow-Wing hovered in regression to perch on Mantus's shoulders. The slate-maned swordsman was now coming at them, throating an eradicating roar.

"Get him, Yellow-Wing!" Mantus snipped out a basal demand as he sailed forward on sunny wings. "I'll eat your scum-bitten heart!" Mantus amplified as he wielded his brilliant blade in midair. He dropped to the ground and lunged at them with an outcry. Tula had been too slow in trying to move away and found herself tripped into an injuring split, then a four-fingered palm wrapped around her wrist. "You're coming with me, wench! Back off, Ioz!" Mantus menaced with a tough epitome, throwing a slivering cutter in front of the ecomancer.

"I choose my crews like I choose my me-ahh!" Tula began an uproarious protest with a bitting temper. She stamped on the gold-crusted boot, she was tangled back.

"Tula!" Ioz blustered with an antagonized pugnacity. He jostled for a way to retrieve the woman. He noticed a damaging wound on her leg from where she fell, and he couldn't reach her in time.

"No complaining, useless wharf-shrew!" The sleazy gambler hauled off with an intemperate upbraid.

"My name is Tula!" Tula hissed with a storming breath as she wrenched her arms against the petrifying clasp. She listened to the kindle of the lighthouse pyre crackling out to her, she hadn't before used her ecomantic powers in a demolishing manner and she wouldn't. She didn't want to hurt Mantus, just to get away. The fire flared and fizzled. "I can't gather my stamina!" She tried to focus her essence, but she couldn't. Something was wrong, and she felt weary. Her legs were weakened and unstable, she would then have to prevent herself from collapsing.

"No! The Autumn Lunartide!" Jenna suddenly outburst from her placement, witnessing Tula's hindrance. Ioz was stunted in time.

"Bloth left you as mine, and as mine, it's my desire to call you an impudent wharf-shrew!" Tula found herself met with a subjugating slap on the face from her captor. The sorceress then rebounded.

"I'm no damsel, you clod!" Tula screamed with a fierce temper. She single-handedly broke free of Mantus's pull and flipped him on his back, yet she trembled. Is this what Ioz was warning her about? She retreated as he began to rise and plow forward with the piercing slasher. "Look out!" With a stressed verve Tula alarmed. She pushed herself and Ioz over and out of the way to save them, thus causing Mantus's blade to become ingressed in the wall.

"Noy borga!" Mantus cursed as his scimitar would not come unstuck. "Get them you slime-brains!" He growled out as sparse characters started heading toward the two defenders. Ioz tackled Mantus from behind.

"Not much of a threat without your sword, are you cheat? You reedy stick of a savage kreld-eater! You fatally harmed Tula, now I'm going to ruin you!" Ioz hollered roughly, verbally and physically assaulting. He pounded the crippled commander with his robust fists and Mantus whimpered and hissed, competing to gain control of the situation.

"I didn't do anything, you idiot, she has-!" Mantus blared with the start of an aghast and snide comeback, before being socked by the swart powerhouse once again.

"Jitatan Mantus! Where is Ren?! Tell me where he is or I'll throw you into a bilge-hold of your own making! There's no contests that fists can't solve for shameful pond-scum like you!" Ioz strongly wrung out the lowlife as he continued to relentlessly pulverize him with unyielding blows. The skinny second-in-command had been beaten on his back when his face flooded with a sneaky grin. Ioz stopped on a dilatorily signal, by the time he had caught on it was too late. He felt himself being hoisted up and squeezed by a quaternary of arms, then tossed aside.

"You Maelstrom loyalists are jitata hard to find these days, Mantus!" Strand hectored in approach as Ioz rubbed his cranium and fortified the fleeting attempt to clamber to a verge of standing.

"Good to see you made it out Strand, you're keeping 'Her memory alive." The second-in-command's cool greeting stung as he crept a fleer and lifted himself off the ground. Mantus dislodged his blade from the wall it was wedged into and circled around to jeer at them.

"These four arms are good for more than dropping anchors!" Strand boasted proudly. "I only wish 'She were still alive so you could repay me with Bloth's praise." Strand crowed cunningly as he and the commander shared in a smile of shysters.

Ioz peered through the broken pane and saw Strand's dagron flying away. "You nogood lousy pile of bilge-waste! Allow me to show you to your proper fate-!" Ioz roared fearlessly and charged back at Strand with the might of his knuckles, he again fell over in failure. The pilferers in the lighthouse mobbed around the resistance, stilling Ioz and Tula in a vise-tight grasp. This time they were unfortunately defeated, restrained by the capable henchmen.

"Ay jitata." Tula weakly griped as Ioz snarled.

"I will command the seas forever!" Mantus gloated of his victory, pridefully asserting his yearning.

"Like the scum-pits you will!" Tula shuffled in her binds, confronting the icy warden with obstinacy.

"Take them to the wares-closet inside the dungeons' hold! There they'll wait to be corrected." Mantus paced to and fro as he circulated with his demands. He stopped, then freezing Tula with a penetrative glare.

"Commander Mantus! We need to watch old woman to make sure she don't do peculiar thing!" The bumbling bozo on the left of the boss hinted his directive to Jenna, who was restlessly scooting to the otherside of the stake.

"No! I have this under control!" Mantus hissed with scorn at the potential of anyone questioning his authority, he snagged his claws on the interrupter's fleshy mitt and removed it from his person. His malign umbrage bore thorns at Ioz's grimace.

"You sick son of a sea-mule, what did you do to her?!" Ioz nearly busted free by confiscating a stumpy guard's curved blade, unsoundly vexed by Tula's blemished condition.

"No, wait!" Jenna cried out from the middle of the room. "It can only be! The Autumn Lunartide, it's effecting Tula's ecomantic powers!" She brought to front with an apace vagueness. The commander hurled her an endangering stare.

"Lunartide? What in Kuunda's tavern is this jitatan Lunartide-nonsense?" The clueless rogue by Tula clunked over Jenna's phrase as he fought to step on some toes, and earned himself a thwack on the temple from a terrorizing rascal. Ioz rolled clear to escape from his restrainers, only to cross the clunking boots of Strand.

"You're going to be drinking your meals through a swamp-reed, Ioz!" Strand chuckled with a cumbersome thrill, flouting as he suppressed the rebellious thief with a set of newly-grown arms.

"In that case...I don't need a knife!" Ioz heaved after a grand huff and painfully slammed his footwear into the thug's knees, pressuring a release. Throwing the sword, he coughed to gather energy to flee from six central-limbs. He waddled backward at Strand's irascible lurch.

"When she learns to mature her abilities the Autumn Lunartide will grant her great wisdom and strength, but as a young ecomancer it will only slow her down and make her weak!" Jenna precipitantly advised in return. Tula reclaimed the short-sword, arming herself as Ioz captured Mantus in a hostage-chokehold against Strand's sledgehammer grips.

"So larva-meat, to defy orders or to flog me. It's your question, old friend-!" Strand could merely mud-sling as his boss succumbed to the vigor of Ioz's copper brawn and prevented him from acting for the stigma of harming his superior-officer in the process. "Do it now, Tula." Tula faulted but Ioz was aware she collected the steel he had plunked down. The handle in Tula's fingers entertained the complexity in killing Mantus, and found she wouldn't get away any better with plunging the knife through his throat.

"That was the prefect opportunity, why did you stop, woman?!" Ioz's distraught pupils flinched as the loudness of a sharp trim clinking against stone flurried in the wrestle, Mantus's neck was exposed.

"I can't take his life, it's holy Kuunda's job alone!" Tula regretfully shed her remorse, she wrangled with her living blood as she was torn between two sides of her nurturing heart.

"Ay chungo! Ren isn't with us and you can't abandon the morality? This is no game! Do you know what he will do to us, to you-" Ioz's back molar popped from the socket when Mantus struck him short. The woman couldn't understand, he knew a master-dealer like no other. The vigilant swashbuckler tripped the quartermaster's twisting hip but the devious shark had set the trap with a cackle and Ioz was first in line.

Ioz had avoided retention, only to catch himself on a hitch laid at the deviant's whim. After which, the withering daredevil was swatted inside an aperture within the stone panel by a kick from Mantus and effectively trapped. Tula outcried as Yellow-Wing dropped down. The wicked advisor of Bloth pitched his torch into a crevice of the airtight box.

"Quiet, Old-wench!" Mantus loutishly shouted, raising his weapon at the offending noise. Jenna's eyes closed, suddenly something started happening. "Huuntar should keep him compliant until Bloth returns to personally instruct his fate, I wonder how long Ioz can stand his roasting might being crushed by the pressure from the drain. No one can escape the piercing chute from my fly-spy's veins and Octopon's reef granules will calcify anything that comes close. He'll be gimped in no time and sent beneath the pipeline under this powerful lighthouse, if he is so fortunate." He determined with a satisfied assurance.

"We'll wrap 'em all up and let Huuntar juice 'em." Strand ferverently cackled as the belligerent Huuntar arose to wring fatal quills upon the living ragtags, Ioz gruesomely locked within.

"Run Tula, before we're mumified!" Niddler hightailed through the cycling burst of dry air, fleeing from a machinating Strand.

"Who shall handle the madam and her flying rat?" Yellow-Wing simpered at the suffering ecomancer and monkeybird, gleaning with his usual formality. "Does this scorpionrat want to take them down to the storeroom?" He shined a tricky glint of his beak to Strand.

"Not needed, pelting this ecomancer with some Dark-Ecomantic energy should obliterate her every effort to resist, and the flying waste can stay precisely where he is." Mantus drifted a looming surveillance to a capable Niddler, who withdrew in cowardice. From around his neck he appraised the valuable amulet fashioned from pure Ruukaana.

% uproar down the hall,

"Thank, you. Commander Mantus, Sir." ?spankd his filthy-wench

"Kyarr?" commander knelt down to place a goblet of kleepa on the sealed box by mossy eyes shocked of harsh loathing

"Never!" in her ?panic, knocked glass from the top and chipped the rim. she rejtectd Commander Mantus's offer to spare her captv life, and he signaled the order for Viira to satisfy the grunts in a myraid of brutes, thrust the broken cask into the sea-gyp'sdkd mouth and sauctai

Solia struggled binds watched the chocolte-haird woman gagged by the mouth Another in the closed cot

"Solia. strp stockin crset laced

Mantus cushions arranged

"Your ttle? bdy just screams for it, yes, lass?" rosy cheeks withdraw and embedded deep, the tubular-hairs rubbed inside pressing tiny spasms, and into her rear

ripped her gag off

"Mant', pleeasefill MantusspleaseMaster-!Manusthe hilt of cutlass nsrted

what kind of fantasy through the brick, while Solia hung - by a narrow tether hidethred? near-comatose the second-in-command hefted his slacks and the? begging so much,

kleepa

"Let Ioz go, you sea-leech! If he falls...I promise you, Mantu-" Tula flared a willful scowl of emerald, she shivered as she absorbed the torture from her vanished peer. Mantus had everything but ignored the agony of Ioz that exploded from underneath the turret.

"You have to be cruel to be cruel. Evil things come to those who wait, and I'll make sure your lifeblood crashes at my influence, dirt-hauling wench." Bloth's commander nipped an injurious intent at the wrestling enchantress. From his utility, he detached a murky ocarina. Placing it to his lip, he reveled in the fright of Tula and Niddler.

"Let me out! I can't take anymore, I'm going to die! I don't want to die! I promise I'll never mutiny again!" The loudest cries ever heeded from Ioz stripped the delicate ears of Mantus and those in the top floor of the tower, a timid breeze flowed to ruffle the sullen mane of the now-aiding second. Mantus tipped up the slab of brick off the slope and did not meet his face on a half-ruined pirate but Ioz was crouched by a snuffled-out torch, staring resentfully at him. "Pirate's promise." He whispered. "I lied." Ioz swung over the hurdle, belting Mantus a clunky boot to the scalp. He moved forward as he hefted a chunk of block and raised it above his topknot to release at the second-in-command's height, barely missing.

"Don't think I'm not aware of ironic deaths." Arising from a skid to the balcony, Mantus serenely skipped out of the spill of a treasure chest loaded with enough gold to crunch his bones. Circling around Ioz once, he pinned the fellow gambler to a return placement by Tula. He lauded his successive conquest over the Wraith's crew.

"We have to take this whistle from him, or he'll have the chance to-" Tula divergently unsettled her toe at the pile to disarrange some of the coins, where the dormant ocarina was discarded from the enemy's belt.

"Leave it." Ioz rashly entreated, locking sturdy biceps around the wanning femme as she closely skimmed the landing. The wind proceeded to pick up from within the garret and whipped about. Objects toppled over and the guards in the gallery ousted their balance and slipped. In those few moments, the pirate and the ecomancer were able to escape but had barely been able to seize their legs on the whipping ground.

"Ahhh!" Strand yowled as he bunged out the window, dispensing down below as it became no longer possible for him to latch on to the banister of the lighthouse chamber.

"What wizardry is this?!" Mantus exclaimed bitterly, in the midst of being whirled away. "Yellow-Wing!" He wailed to the golden monkeybird, who had been faltering to constrain his flight in the room. The winged primate hopped on the commander's regalia and lugged him out the open arch. Barrels and other storage items blew and chucked in his aftermath. The tornado's vacuum collapsed everything pulsing within the suction.

"Come back and fight like a monkeybird!" Niddler fussed, shaking a mitt at the escaped pair.

The dying of the zephyr ensued, Tula swiftly scooted to Jenna to untie the ropes binding her. "Jenna, I didn't know you were an ecomancer!" Tula was astonished.

"I was trying to stall them! I have not done that in a very long time!" Jenna imprudently professed, quite surprised at herself.

"Quickly! We have to get out of here if we want to find Ren because we're running out of time!" Ioz directed with haste. He scanned around. "Some weapons would be nice, too!" He curtly said of their impromptu status, he did not see anything in sight he could plunder that was not shoddily attached to another man's hand.

"Hey!" Tula vocalized a gravity of something. "Where's Ren's sword, the 11th Treasure of Rule?!" She started to panic, awareness pinged her memory. The Sword was left at the lighthouse, but she realized Bloth had searched the place from head to toe. She suddenly felt stricken with consternation.

"It's safe, my child. I saw a ship that was not yours making its way through the dark water. I knew it could not be possible and could only mean trouble, so I buried it." Jenna clarified with surety.

"Where, Jenna, where?" Tula inquired with dreadful urgency.

"Show us where it is, quick!" Ioz severely urged.

"Give me a moment, I'm not young like you are anymore!" Jenna prompted as she impelled toward the stairs as nimbly as she could. The twain shipmates and Niddler pursued closely behind, just as some pirate adversaries were beginning to rouse.

"Who are you?" the chained nilly ner-comase , did n retract

"H-Uunn-uhh please again, Commander Mantus, Sir-!...Pleas-" too of to mve, eyes rolled bck. remnants barbed-wre twsting lgswresting?

"Ioz, look. What's that?" Tula beckoned with haste, she pointed out to a green and scaly monster that was trying to climb the wall of the tower. Below the creature, Strand lay unconscious on the ground.

"Noy jitat! Strand's dagron! That's how the slimy naja-dog made it here." Ioz rapt sordidly as he approached. The dagron persisted to claw the wall, it hooked something in it's mouth. From behind Tula Jenna peered nervously at the beast.

"It seems to be carrying something." Jenna watchfully acknowledged, utterly quiet and quite timid. Tula inspected her tensely.

"Jenna, where is the place you buried the Sword?" Tula hurriedly solicited the proprietor, Jenna had been about to lead onward when Ioz distracted himself.

"Jitatan Maelstrom jolly roger! Give it here, you stupid-senseless beast! We'll trick that jitatan-" Ioz grunted with frustrated breath. He had somehow accomplished a scale up the torso of the dagron and attempted to pull the starkly-olive pennant out of the mandible. The dagron clamped down, insistent to hang on to the triangular patch.

"Ioz, stop. We have better things to do than decimate the enemy flag. Come on!" Tula scampered out, her smart emeralds fixed on the man whom she needed practically to drag away. She shifted uncomfortably and arranged her waistsash into a different formation before tearing over the rocks ahead.

"Ioz, we need to protect Tula as much as we can." Jenna entirely signified.

"Jitatan lunartide." Ioz grimly mumbled. "About to take on Bloth's finest and ugliest, and here we are. To think any woman I've known from Janda-town never claimed otherwise." He sorely grumbled with a relinquishing huff. "Come on, woman. Chungo, I still say we need to trip him up." Ioz let go of Daggered-Skull depiction of a Constrictus on the ripped fabric and supported Tula with his arm as they skedaddled, she seemed to settle with an easing aura.

"You know, I think Ioz is right. We need disguises." Tula entertained her hardy cohort's suggest for a few moments, and then gleamed with creativity.

The reverse of the tower was dinged with smokiness, now taken over by isolation. The golden infusion had descended from the current in a mix of feathers and mane. From the accessible stoop a clump ensued, decimating the entire muteness on the rungs to the basement. The hatch-door to the storeroom of the lighthouse slapped shut after the falling tremor.

"Yellow-Wing, get us out." The commander consoled what felt like a broken arm, but it was not. The vicious mammalian preened scarified quills after his trip. Their phrases inflated in the blackened vacuum of melody. The flaxen bird was about to remount by taxed plumes when the water droplet of a recent rainstorm screeched on the stony cement.

"No...Not again! Stay away me, Zuuror Mantus of Qui-Qua! Not going with your to hometown! Leg is broken! Thumbbites are found near the Palace of Scholars...my homefriend Taneuka told me about Heave-Off, Ioz told her Twelve Years ago! Enough, no more!" Mantus was welcomed by a squealing woman donning a crown of lilac and leg shackles. She tugged upon his ankles, almost knocking him over.

"What?! I hardly did anything to you! The closest village of My Origin is in Kalinda, and I'm not taking you there! Get back, stupid wench!" The stunned tactician was caught off-guard, but he quickly kicked Jazhea to the ground and wielded his lash. The gowned princess only cried more, now mopping tears into the floor. She convulsed as if she were mentally disoriented. He groped around at his belt, but found he had misplaced the chemical he sought for.

"Be quiet!" Mantus clipped both his clawed hands over his hearing, gritting his jaw. Jazhea's splitting tantrum hurt his sensitive Quin ears, it was as grating, if not moreso, than a razorbeak's caw. Yellow-Wing's cutting talons scarred the rebel from her stance. "Forget her, Yellow-Wing. Fly us out of here!" He pleaded for escape to the overcast heavens.

"Uhhh...we might wanna take a flood-check on that one, Mant'." Yellow-Wing distressed as he fluttered up to tug on the sealed entryway, he soon gave up.

"Noy jitat!" In frustration and anguish Mantus lobbed his blade in a random direction. "Why can't you be a trooper like she was! I should have corrected your arms!" He minced his garbled words at the normally vitrolic dame, who was screaming like a helpless child.

"It isn't worth fighting anymore, you Z.M.Q. too tough for me!" Jazhea shrieked in complaint, covering her face with her ruined locks. "Can't feel my back and hungry! Something growing in shoe!" She was sobbing buckets. "No believed a single word said since I left home, I can't see again...now I'll suffer Eel-blood! Aunt Vaecusa...why I should run away my lessons and married Xilok, I wish he were still to hug me!" She genuinely wailed the last octave her soul ever would of it's own will, shaking in a fetal mass before the terror Eel-blood could touch her flesh.

"No more eel-blood threats, woman! For silence and no crying!" Mantus gently made his promise as he craftily reclaimed his edge from the ground, gripping it behind his back. Jazhea trembled but slowly simmered to choking drops, even though all from her perspective was void. He smirked. She would deserve only a swift and painless death. He pulled her back up as she slipped into a cold unconsciousness.

"Thanks for the tip, mate. I'll remember it next time I see ye!" The peculiar commotion was hearkened, someone who appeared to be wearing shoes of alloy platemetal dashed away from the area at the newcomer's advance. The pouring light trickled into the enclosure from the outside. "Let her go, Mantus! You're not having your ceremony here and if you try, it'll be the last time you wear your claws!" There was a thump in the dark as a strange guest roared down the stairway. Jazhea found herself lambasted away. In less than an instant, a flash of color was already clinking swords with the pitiless criminal. The dual clash could be heard, the thwarted quarry was freed from the grueling duress. "This fell off, try it." The same presumably-honest contender pinged a petty doodad of silver at the harried woman, she came to.

"No Z.M.Q. shiny fish-bait!" The dame gasped. "Ioz?" Her desperate pulse called out to whom she believed she met as she regained her posture. She brushed the key on the ground.

"Ioz? I know him. Wait...I know you! You better run, young lady." The stranger at first inflected curiously at the mention of the name before his pitch switched to one of hardness. "Scavenger! You should have kept your greed across the street, where it belongs! Ready for the last dance, yuugla-bait? Now I'll show you the openbar, closed!" He ground hostility at the despicable foe in capacity.

"Stalwart words from such a spineless conspirator! Ayyyahh!" Mantus routed with a venomous cry, creating another masterly swing and ready to fiercely retaliate. The jangle sounded at the drop of a precious item, a green ember rolled away from the clacking of blades and dove inside Jazhea's hand. "Get him, Yellow-Wing!" Mantus commanded as he pulled a confiscated Starzooka from upon the floor and the correctly aimed Starfish-projectiles slammed at the interrupting hero, he tilted the man-sized launcher back to prepare for another full round of ammo.

"Got it, chum!" The snide monkeybird assisted, he soared after the hampered likeness.

"Aye, you're a good star-shot. Now use your sword and fight like a man, Mantus, not a landlubbin' bar-pony. Call off your sailing-bird, sea-weasel." The unwieldy protagonist pointed to the set of wings. With a smirk Yellow-Wing retreated and curved to the convenient overhang to watch the fight. The blazing contestant stampeded as Mantus smugly drew the annihilating ripper. "Don't tell me I interrupted a cardgame between you and this 'gent. This scum-bucket did something bad! He is outta your league, and he moves faster than that." Already the rescuer was sweating as he peered a gruff glint on the frigid foe and the backward escapee.

"Sorry...Try! Can't see! Z.M.Q.!" Jazhea lamentably patted for the ankle locks to pick at with the conventional key, nerve-wracked as she tampered evermore speedily. She screamed when the door shuddered and closed.

"As I have to tell Ioz, there's two things you don't wanna chance your gold on, Fate, and Mantus. I often have to remind my old friend of the earnings for spitting in fate's eye, or do you want to walk down the stern before Ren and your friends up there? Try the canon for the exit, leave and don't come back here. You can use the ride outside-" With a billowing hint he slid her the Starzooka across the screeching gravel, but it was too much for her weakened torso to lift.

"Not so fast for the wench, it's hard for the Princess of Octopon to run when every bone below her flank has been ultimately transformed into blood-plasma. At least, she wasn't in pain. I couldn't find the eel-dispenser." Mantus admired his unblemished blade as he mouthed an unfortunate excuse.

"Noy borga, you're kidding me." The protector gradually tiptoed in reverse to ensure Mantus wouldn't pull a fast slip.

"I think it's better if Bloth doesn't hear about this." Mantus calmly shifted his eyes with a satisfied grin, he was proud of his work. There, under the torchlight, the benefactor met the blind pupils of the sniffing woman. She was unscathed, scratch-free. No blood or wounds, but below the hips rested the melded bag of violet skin that was her legs with the melted bones within and oozing out of their sockets. Mantus speedily cleaned the Starzooka, chucking it into a mound of gold where a spiny fish was discarded.

"Naja-nuts. You know what, Mantus? How about we make us a deal...I pay you eight-million drabul and my old-man's entire inheritance-fund to stop working for Bloth. Hey, if you join our side, I'll throw in the gamehouse too." The drifter backtracked with a damper breath before he lowered his weapon and stated his offer.

"Why would I risk those assets on a single kleepa-husk when the Treasures of Rule await their Commander." Bloth's assassin disengaged. He slickly rejected the proposal.

"You know I'm serious, matey." The dry sailor said his oath with a humorless grunt.

"I know." Mantus drafted his slicer to make a premature clash, barely his words touched level volume. The cutlass of the meaty hand was ripped from it's owner.

"Aye-Aye, ma'am, let's get you away from Mantus. We need to bust this jitatan trap-door open but I'd bet a few elbow-heaves from me will about do it." The visitor no longer held a sweetness as he urged the burdened princess over his shoulder to vacate the area. Within the golden hoard, a form of a bameme began to leech out of the Starzooka barrel. The outside dagron, as if in sense, worked on tipping the sealed gate. "This darva-snake is off your keel. Now." He fended off one more scrap from the ruinous commander. Mantus contrarily broke the crux of steel and pounced to rapidly leg out of the locale as escape became available. The dagron crashed in to pelt the benevolent duelist as he clanged his own weapon with a chiming ring against the enemy cutlass and left even quicker.

"You are not the Lady Luck we're looking for. Stay out of the way." Mantus unlocked the concubine from her service and silenced her with a stinging assurance of futher disfigurement. One wordless gnarl from her former captor instilled all the needed distress in Jazhea to stagger free. She pulled from him and mourned for the missing stone.

"I need to find somewhere safe to put ye, because I have to run and find me buddies. This should do it." The free battler trot above and laid a pure and very sweet Joiquiva to rest everlasting in a ditch under folded sea-lilies, brushing the headband out of her matted mess. The innocent damsel was crippled by even more tortures she would soon undergo for being an unsophisticated female, her body was at peace for as long as permissible.

"Right!" Jazhea affirmatively took the benign stranger at his word and clasped her lucky amulet that fell from Mantus's neckline earlier. "Sun-Beard! Chaos! Z.M.Q.! Lady Luck! The hives!" She only stuttered one final time to place a concerned glimpse at the distinguishable redhead.

"I promise I'll come back for ye both! Bloth and his men never claw through sand they've already dug in. That I know, you'll have to trust me word." The rugged warrior insisted with his own farewell to the cache. He examined the golden lady's note and crinkled it into the ocean.

The key in this chamber it too powerful for you to use, Mer will be destroyed with such a curse unless Ioz is told the hives will be coming soon...he's the only one who will understand because he knows the password for Ren.

"Sun-Beard? Now that's a new one. Aye, Mantus must be working with Z.M.Q. What a fate worse than death...poor crazy soul." He watched the regal madam careen away from his vision as he ran.

"Beesall!" Jazhea cried after blindly hitting the egress of a sewer-grate, having tumbled over her pale garb. While she could still talk, the strum from a mortal heartbeat beside her was by a convulsion to regurgitate the contents of her pulsing stomach. Blood swelled from her slitting lips, an enigmatic insect with the breadth of a morph hand crawled from her throat.

The four scurried out to an area in the rear of the building where there was a mat of dirt, in which resided a shallow grave marred in the sand. Ioz wiped sweat from his forehead, taking a sparing recess from digging. Something shining at last came free as the hands dug through the dirt.

"Now, no one will guess we're anyone worth robbing!" Tula rejoiced in her fresh garb of a sheer skirt above her knees, a stained blouse and headband. Wrapped about her front was her commonplace waistsash. She abandoned her tarnished silks.

"I don't think I'm fooling anyone." Ioz fidgeted in a makeshift imitation of Tula's wardrobe, his balmy muscles bulged out of the rosy chemise. His hair was loose and rung like his female counterpart. "I wouldn't even be doing this if there was someway...to prevent Mantus from chancing on the opportunity to use that Dark-ecomancy whistle. Have to protect the woman, barnacle-grub-of-a-scot-pango-sea-crab. This was your idea." Ioz directed his mock at a shrugging Jenna, who was representing an Octopian nun.

"Yo-ho-chukka-ho-wa! I think Ioz is quite a looker!" Tula lightly teased, whirring in harmony with her drafty outfit. Her irritated chaperon hid ruby cheeks, Tula was showing more leg than Ioz was used to seeing from her.

"You're just saying that because you have the Lunartide." Ioz extracted the Sword, standing it with care in his hands. "Now we just have to find Ren!" Ioz unveiled the prime course next, but it was a little too-late. From the stronghold, a threatening pirate sprung down at him to assail the turnout at the foundation. "Noy jitat!" Ioz cursed to his blind-sided quagmire. He was going to swing the token cutlass he had just picked up when from out of the shadows, another weapon clanged with the one of his attacker. The pillager then ran away in fear of the emerging stranger who had stopped his ambush. Ioz jawdropped.

"Looks like you could've used a hand!" The warm giant greeted them with a friendly ahoy. "Is it just me or did Mantus sprout a pair of wings from the last time I saw him?" He convened as Ioz now found himself armed with a sword similar in model to his own. Tula, a long scimitar. Zoolie smiled in benign salutation.

"Zoolie?! How in the twenty-" Ioz could not finish his sentence before the direful benefactor who just dropped in rushed him off the subject.

"Long story." Zoolie briskly summarized. "I hope you guys are alright. I gotta get back to Avagon's fleet and tell her that Bloth is here and not in East-Meridol where she thinks he's keeping Ren." He curtailed seriously, seemingly more troubled than his usual self would compose.

"Avagon's fleet? Bloth is keeping Ren? But...Bloth is here." Tula tried to wrap herself around what the barkeeper just said.

"Excuse me, everyone. If you don't mind, I'm kind of hungry. I haven't eaten since I've found you both. Can't we come back to this later and crunch on a breakfast of sea-champions? Actually, my stomach feels like it's going to disintegrate, all that flying has me woozy..." Niddler groaned as a partial ravenousness began to set in.

"Make sure you invite Bloth too, Niddler, since he'll be ruling us all with an iron fist." Ioz bestowed his impartial feedback to the interruption.

"Don't be so hard on him, Ioz, he's been through as much as we have. Be patient, Niddler. We'll get you something in a moment, it's really important that we find Ren." Tula stringently granted the rainbow primate, not wishing to slant from the discussion.

"I know, but..." Niddler's pleas eventually dwindled.

"Avagon was misled. Ploy by his men, no doubt. He's certainly not in Meridol." Zoolie sedately sighed. "Only problem is she's so far away from here now. So should I have brought a costume for when me lead-foot mercenary and I claw-clacked in to visit?" He vexed with contemplation. Ioz coughed.

"We have to warn her!" Ioz enforced with no hesitation or stammering.

"No! We can't leave Ren, he's still somewhere here, remember!" Tula movingly reminded him, then Ioz nodded in remembrance of the one sad thing he had forgotten in the instance of detour.

"Ay chungo! What is the matter, Zoolie? I haven't seen you look like that since Mantus crossed the line. I'll go in your plac-." Ioz cued of the unexpected condition.

"Don't you worry about that, Ioz. I'm the one that has to get back to her, I came here on my own and I'll leave on my own." Zoolie boosted to his friend the greatest amiable smile he could muster in the situation.

"You'll leave here without your head! I want the ecomancer and Ioz alive! Get rid of the rest!" Bloth erupted the order for onslaught to a petty troop of men. Mantus and Konk patrolled on either perimeter of the Pirate Lord and were advancing with bloodthirsty steel drawn, with them stalked a bundle of gruesome thugs who were not far behind.

"I don't suppose this is a good time to find something to eat?" Niddler reinforced his voracity. Ioz and Tula instantly assumed stance and stepped forward, scowls were unexposed on their begrudged and spirited faces.

"Well, looks like we better indulge them!" Zoolie shouted as he joined the righthandman. "Nice to see ya again, Mantus. Care for a rematch?" The barman taunted the rival.

"My pleasure, Zoolie! Only this time you won't be getting away!" The slim cutthroat replied, leaping swiftly after the slayer of his venin. He could only swoop his sword, but it was met by Zoolie's edge and was not heavy enough so he spun around and struck again. He was blocked recurrently.

"Is that so?" The coral-bearded voyager egged on. "Well it doesn't look like you're off to such a fine start, Girl Arms!" He ridiculed lively before he faced away to his league. "I'll take this one, you got the rest?" He contested his angle of the ploy as he barricaded another cyclonic blow.

"I know who I'm getting!" Ioz growled with a terrifying and ripping flurry, going up against Bloth's hulking knife. "Today you'll die by my sword, darva-blood! I swear to Kuunda I'll kill you, sea-scum! This day Bloth will be shown the pain of this unlucky moonrise, when he's at the end of this pirate's mercy!" All his previous inhibitions seceded, he was consumed with a stupendous rage at the titan.

"I think you may want to consider the order of your words." Bloth began to cruelly flout but then, he noticed Ioz carrying something unusual. It was a sword, almost echoing of Ren's memento armament. He swung Ioz away by the culled blade and half-choked the clatter of the rebellion to gain a closer fix on his perspective. He inaudibly crowed with rejoice.

"What have you done with Ren?" Tula tenaciously demanded as she tore her scimitar at Bloth with all of the might she could pull out of her alternating lifeforce, he impeded both weapons that slipped at him with ease.

"Oh don't worry, my dear, your boy is alive. Although, I wouldn't doubt he does not want to be." The ruinous Pirate Lord perpetuated with venomous sweetness and a smile gleaming with savagery.

"You horrendous dartha-eel!" Ioz boisterously outcried as he swiveled his sparking strip, this time missing. He imagined he sensed a hand grab for him, but it too slipped past him. Tula screamed beside him, she attempted to whip for the murderous villain's copious middle but was now distracted with Konk and an allotment of other looters.

"Give Ren back, you fish-lipped kreld-face!" Niddler stormily shrilled, diving for the grandiose Captain but was prevented by an evil monkeybird, who hovered in his way.

"Sorry, minga-head, but you'll have to wait in line!" Yellow-Wing articulated with a barbarism both formal and brumal. "You did say that you wanted me to fight like a Monkeybird, so now...awk-hah, I am!" He bolted for Niddler, gripping the span of his foe with his claws and trying to pluck out feathers. The two monkeybirds cycled centrifugally in the airway before they crashed to the ground and started to wrestle.

"You traitor!" Niddler yelled out. "Monkeybirds like you are the reason the whole of Mer sees us as no more than slaves!" Niddler valiantly flapped his wings and catapulted Yellow-Wing off of him. "Ohh, I'm so hungry..." He personally grumbled at the wanning of his stomach, making it difficult for him to cut through the air.

/He dashed up and scraped at the vicious avian, attempting to rip his predator's plumage out. Yellow-Wing screeched, he kicked and ejected Niddler from his back.

"Good show, good show." Yellow-Wing cunningly cooed as he puffed his muscular wings, flying off. "Now for the grand finale!" The seaworthy monkeybird hurtled up to the lighthouse and flew inside. Niddler sped after him in hot pursuit. When Yellow-wing reemerged, he was freighting a bucket of something unknown. "This will melt your feathers, borca-breath!" The heinous monkeybird outrageously cawed out. With a sly grin, he chased to a front to coat the now retreating Niddler with the slime in the container. Some of it stuck on contact and the airy simian fell squawking to the ground with disabled wings.

"Niddler!" Tula cried out with concern for the periled species and she rushed in to save him. She aspired to use the last of what she could conjure of ecomantic energy to cleanse some of the stuff off of him, exhaling as she jumbled to her feet. Konk was coming at her with a cleaver. She helped to dry Niddler and rapidly flashed a scimitar at the advancing piglet, cuffing him off his standing leg. She revolved behind her to see in dismay that Jenna was being cornered in the sea. "Jenna!" She invoked aloud. "Try to use your powers!" Tula vigilantly spurred, she spotted the versed ecomancer and tried to blitz a way there to assist.

Jenna continued to retract as the pirates were approaching her, she was unarmed and slowly being backed into the water. She did not think she could do again what she did earlier. "Oh dear, I don't think I can!" She succumbed to her woe as a sickle pronged at her and she fell over to dodge. Tula slashed a path away from the offending marauders but now Konk stood in the way, he was trying to drown the lighthouse-keeper.

Ioz brandished his sword with nothing but pure rage flowing through his veins, all the repressed thoughts and the fears no longer subsisted to restrict him. "I always said you'll never win this..." The raw seafarer's voice was distinctly dark and sweltering with unabated ire. He slashed with indomitable arms at his enemy. The opponent's blade had withdrawn, in a pleasant phenomenon. The score would be settled tonight. That was, until he felt the clink against his back.

"Well Ioz, it appears we've helped each other out again. It's too bad you won't be able to celebrate your victory." Bloth chuckled and as Ioz lashed around and saw that the Sword of Primus had been knocked off from where it was latched.

"Get the sword!" Ioz blazoned from shaking lips, a true chill at last reaching his eyes and ears. "Tula, get the sword!" He urgently screamed to the young ecomancer behind him, who struggled with full hands that were trying to stop Konk from cleaving Jenna underwater.

Jenna's eyes widened. "Listen to the pirate, young one, it can't be replaced! Don't worry about me!" Jenna critically goad the other to forgo her own person before Konk proceeded to push her back more and into the drenching undertow.

"No Jenna, I'm not leaving you!" Under a scream Tula attached to her station. With benevolence she attempted to summon her stability one final time by moving the water, but she was now too flimsy in her vitality and failed in her purpose of releasing Jenna from the gantha-pig's attack. She ultimately was able to tug Jenna to shore. She could only watch helplessly as Konk hied for the saber on the ground, and Ioz, who was too ensnared in fending off Bloth's own gigantic blade, hurried for it a tad too late. The moonrise was not favoring fortune that day.

"Konk will save day, Bloth!" Konk vigorously strut forward and announced with a revolting laugh. He dove in a slide and clutched the heavy and powerful artifact, spinning it to the hulking warlord nearby, who bent to recover it. The Sword bonded into the giant raider's grip and he easily held it out of stretch from the heroes, one-handedly swatting away any chance to claim it. Niddler fluffed immobile feathers, stomach yowling. Ioz stumbled as his own sword was clapped out of his hand.

"By Kayrn's soul in Fezwa you won't, kreld-eater!" Zoolie conflicted from the sidelines of the battlefield, the blithe swordsman only managed to catch a slivering glimpse of the pure Sword falling into evil hands. He dangerously hammered to deflect the current retribution out of the arms of the lean competitor, but by now he could barely move his own.

"No, Zoolie." Mantus's cold-as-steel promise scraped upon the ears of the otherwise-jolly man, he swapped his angle as he blocked away the chivalrous might. "This is where you're wrong." He moved in close with a sinister note. "By the drowned bones of kay, I will." The defender could only hear him say his exit phrase, the red-haired venturer watched him jutting his crafty eyes to his victorious side. Zoolie had floated so far away with Mantus that he was not even in range, it was only when the commander smiled coldly that he knew the fight was over. "This is what happens when you let your emotions influence your battle!" The elite swordsman further debased any uproar, bashing the loosing steel out of Zoolie's arms without delay. The wicked tactician raised his brow and grinned in a last action before he scuttled off to join Bloth. Konk sprung to the Pirate Lord's side and Yellow-Wing perched on the King Conqueror's shoulder.

"Mantus! No!" Zoolie yawed around to swiftly pick up his sword and yell after, but it was too late. The Sword of Primus was gone.

"Perhaps I don't need to take any prisoners after all!" Bloth's menacing laugh shattered over weary ears on the combat zone. The fearless fighters sunk indefeat of the battle they were not meant to win this day.

"Konk get Big Reward!" Konk's sneaky smile and guffaw was the last thing heard.

East of Octopon and in a secluded area not far from Meridol, a company of warriors overseen by an elderly sage trudged through a dense forest.

"Hazo, why have you not been able to point us to his trail by the ship that ferried him?" Avagon consulted of the supposed witness of the capture. Her suspicion was beginning to rise, and her eyes narrowed when she posed her inquiry. This bystander was leading a trail on land, one far inland at that. Bloth was a pirate. This made no sense.

Hazo quickly proceeded to yammer. "Because...Ren is in danger, so Lord Bloth has to stay there. To make sure he doesn't..." Hazo started to drawl off.

"Doesn't what Hazo?" Avagon skeptically requested. "Die?" She cleverly suggested.

"Yes!" Hazo agreed with the pretentious dame's words. "The boy is very near to death! Bloth has to stay there at all times to make sure he doesn't...to watch over him. So he can get the...important information?" Hazo strung his fake explanation. He smiled nervously when he observed Avagon's changed expression.

"Really." Avagon said one word. "You're lying, pirate. Who do you crew for?" Although she sated a clue she straightly interrogated Hazo. She was now harsh with him who had prepared to backtrack in terror, as the attendants behind were advancing.

"Avagon! Avagon!" The white-haired captain diverted as she hearkened her name being desperately called.

"It's you, Friends!" Avagon blurted with surprise. She identified Tula and Niddler's form above her.

"Bloth is at the lighthouse! We come in Zoolie's place!" Tula trumpeted from atop a dagron.

"So he is." The nival matron sternly avouched, not doubting at all. "Company. When you return to shore, pull out! Go West! Tell Loren those are Avagon's orders." She instructed as her fighters nodded. She again attended to Hazo, who was trying to flee but could not in time. "If this was not such an urgent matter, you would surely meet your penalty, pirate, but since I am needed elsewhere you are fortunate to go free. Do not take it for granted." She cautioned and glared down at Hazo, she threw him back as the cowardly man circled to run away. She stashed away her sword in it's holster upon her back and climbed on Tula's dagron. The two women and the monkeybird set out from the jungle, lighthouse-bound.

The bolted door to an impenetrable room was impacted open as a pair of figures emerged with torches. Now the wan hostage inside braced himself for another attack, being unable to evade.

"Why does it glow, Prince?" The beastly pursuer was upon the lad and demanding, ready to unleash a violent tempest at any time. The Brilliant sword, which would not dazzle in the attacker's palm was held to Ren. It joyfully lit up when close to the manacles of the pithy royal. Captain Bloth clutched his torch a finger-lick away from the form of the prisoner.

Ren's fierce eyes embraced with a determination stolid. The fire had not touched, but he could feel the heat from the flame stroking his neck. He was worn from trying to claw and kick at the walls behind him in previous, withered attempts of escape. Nothing he tried would break this time.

"You must be worried, Bloth, if you won't let your other scum-eating goons in here..." Ren stood his ground as dreadful sweat dripped from his forehead, he suffered for it when a gross and offended hand rapidly clenched the side of his jaw. After he had begun to think things through, Ren did not believe Niddler was dead. Not yet. He did not envision his nemesis would do anything else, not when worthwhile information was still needed. He hoped that was right.

"He won't talk, his legs should tear if we take our time. Or shall I prepare the sea-shredder, Sir?" The shoddy request of the second-in-command amended to his Master's inquisition. The behemoth presented him with a steely glance, yet did not answer.

"You're going to tell me why this Sword is Alight. You're going to tell me what it does, and you're going to tell me how to use it!" Bloth's appeal of frustration heavily affirmed Ren's even desperation was no appeasement, shooting his glare at the young nobleman. "Son of Primus. I will find out on my own, and when I do, you will suffer dearly for your insolence!" The impatient growl then ceased after his threatening, his intense inflection changed. He hissed as if a note had struck. "You know, Ren." The ferocious calm began soundly. "The Treasures of Rule can never be destroyed, but I wonder what will become of them when bound to a mortal soul? I heard somewhere before, perhaps from someone close to you that upon finding the Thirteen Treasures of Rule, they will not only grant their Master great Power but also merge into one Magnificent Power. I wonder, if it's true." He heartily mused, unsettling as he bore the dumbfounded royalty in the eye.

When Bloth came to such a conclusion, Ren twitched in a trembling shudder as he discernibly knew nothing of this. He normally would not have shown hysteria too bluntly, for as long as able. His thoughts fluttered, he was stunned. How did Bloth find out? His Father. Ren whipped his head away but Bloth grabbed his chin, forcing the prince to face him. Mantus, from behind the terrible enemy, immorally sneered on a separate intrigue. "Take your ship out to sea, Bloth." He scrunched his drooping eyes and pessimistically droned on the last remark that he could come up with.

"Octopon is a long distance from Qui-Qua on dagron-back." Bloth sportively chided.

"Bloth, why are you doing this? What do you have to gain by a Quest for Treasures you can't use, at least not to their entirety?" Ren fluttered his dismally broken stare once more, his eyes opening as he conversed with a dispirited but sincere interest.

"You make a tempting offer, Son of Primus, to see you suffering with an appreciative awareness of why you'll never again experience any more than misery and why those Treasures of Rule belong only to me...hmm." Bloth lackadaisically mulled over a tactic within his mind's reach. "I think we should tell our Prince about his...roots." He delighted at this concept, while Mantus granted a sinister nod. "I'm going to explain something to you, Boy, and when I do you had better hope I'm in the spirit to entertain your moral harangue." His volume recessed a buzzing dive as he grasped at the collar on the stark lad with a swift threat. Ren acceded his agreement. "This will steer your mind off-course. You need to sit down for this, oh, I guess you can't." He chuckled bitingly and proceeded onward thereafter. "You have heard her name, Avadasia of Stalagor, the Pirate Queen?" Bloth albeit bitterly deduced, while Ren actively lit up at the mention.

"Pirate Queen? No. Avadasia was a Queen of Octopon before my Father's reign, Dowager of Octopon's Star Meadows, as Jenna always told." Ren honestly rebuked with a stifled fleer, verging upon a less draining rhythm.

"Yes. Your Grandfather's wife." Bloth knowledgeably confirmed, resolving to share the clue of personal significance.

"What are you trying to say?" Ren blinked his tapering eyes, absolutely mystified.

"And recent wife to every King of the Thirteen main nations of Mer." Bloth appended in a hushed overtone, the twisted grin smartly adorned his presence.

"That's impossible!" Ren protested with a hardened vigor. He had hoped to come upon some chance to sway the lord of havoc, but now he simply wished Bloth would stop feeding him lies and taking him for a fool.

"Ahh, it would be, dear Prince, except when Avadasia's talents are entrancing...not so much. I told you beforehand, you should have taken a seat, lest leviathons swallow you in the Abyss until your legs tire." The manipulative Captain processed after a gladdened cackle, to which Ren merely sighed and abode in attention. "Let me clarify. Avadasia was Queen of Octopon, who you may call, a corrupt Queen. During her eve she single-handedly furthered the export of the precious material, Ruukaana, to use it in her alchemy for obtaining the Thirteen Treasures, for their enigmatic magics were at the time sealed among the bottom of the twelve oceans and guarded solely by royal legions of each nation. Simple enough, yes? Now as you may know, North to Qui-Qua isle, formally home to the Quiin-Draconik and the Kree tribes, is historically a traditional enemy to the pirating island of Valjen on the opposite pole of the globe. Unfortunately for the native Quiin, the mines were located on their territory. Want to take a bet at who was shipping Avadasia's Ruukaana-ore?" He hinted with a teasing whisper, leaning over the shuddering physique of the mindful teen.

"I don't know." Ren gruelingly shook his head, but he remembered Ruukaana. The innocent prince had seen it on his mother's crown, once Queen Avadasia's Crown.

"Right, Queen Avadasia of Valjen. How is this possible you may ask? Many believed Avadasia was merely driven for gold and vanity by her obsession with Ruukaana. This wasn't true, of course. She needed the versatile metal for use in her shape-shifting Magicks, since she only could possess the magic of one Treasure of Rule to help her at the time. The devious queen could only counterfeit gems as decoys, and to do so she needed one very Special material found only on the island of Stalagor, one that she was automatically attuned to use. Call it Element Abyss, if you will."

"Also, she needed a little help from an Ecomantic source, but this would be more than achievable because on one faraway moonrise, Stalagor and Andorus were on prosperous-terms. In Avadasia's case, young Teron's father completed suitably enough after she tricked him into poring his entire Life's energy into the Treasure she was exploiting for her imitations. She thus charged the gem under sovereign Stalagor with enough staying power to forge the Abysmal Element to her Will, but were she not defying nature, she could do so at whim without the use of ore as a third medium. Elemental ecomancy has untold potentiality with the Treasures' energy, of course." Bloth simpered after a revolting composure, reveling surreally in Ren's stupor.

"This is why Salamantha and Cray were covetous for my Father's Legacy and the Saga he owned, a freedom only the Treasures of Rule can bring. If only they were here to abduct you, Bloth." Ren could hardly mouth with a cynical lip, accepting that this anecdote would not end well.

"Did I happen to mention, Queen Avadasia tricked Ioz's uncle into making a cargo-shipment, twice the distance from Valjen to Octopon for her Life-Ruukaana? I'm sure Ioz and his younger sister, Solia, were very surprised with what their scavenger family received as payment inside that box, a bit of the Abysmal Element from the Year of the Black Tide and the Birth year of King Primus's Son? How entirely unfortunate it must have been for a would-be loyalist crewman to leave the only woman who knew him on the seas, having sacrificed his body and labor for her when her vessel fell into the Maelstrom's ambush. That willful wench, Captain...what was her name again, I believe she was a sister to one of my third-mates of twelve-year's reprieve but...it's not Important." Bloth heftily mused, the braggart glorying of a farflung disfigurement.

"What? Then, why is it Ioz never mentioned this?" Ren denied with a hint of distrust. Something bothered him, in the way of Avagon's retelling of the Valjen-raids on Octopon's shores.

"Why is it, maybe because you are so susceptible to lies. Or because you think it's good that your fellow, Ioz, looks after you, but it's only because he feels remorse for his own father, of who's end I saw to. Ioz returned to the Maelstrom from his home on Tayhoj despite seeing his beloved crewman, Raymit, scream for him to never abandon that wench, Solia. Ohh, and how he met that hapless bar-salt Zoolie, on my crew, who stayed in-part because he was tired of a wretched life on that cursed isle, Ebron, nothing in likeness to the dangers he simply could not handle as a lone pirate sojourning the twenty seas. Pitiful Ioz, lost not only his captain Raymit, but his sanity on land at any mention of the unwitting trap played by Avadasia and her ecomantic fiends. Of all the ecomancers , Tula is...something special." His secrets fancied fraud but in a difficultly-read riddle, Bloth was pleased with certain ideas about an exotic empath.

"Just get it over with, Bloth." Ren emptily requested. Bloth selfishly adored his method of inflicting woe, he imparted further his seeping tune of the daunting history.

"Changing her genetic form was arduous however, even with an ecomancer's aid. Poor Avadasia, The Changing Queen of the Pirates needed to keep using more and more resources. Ruukaana. Dagron hides. Sunken ships. Leviathan bones. Her depletion of the world from it's living substances allowed her to sail to countries beyond and deceive foreign leaders. Every worthwhile power of Mer was taken by her charms, at different points in her lifetime of course but sometimes at the same time, if she could arrange for their disappearance. Anyone and anything her mind fancied was her's. Octopon. Andorus. Qui-Qua. Baanjamar. Bentaar. Ebron and Draja. Delpha. Pandaawa and the Mobo District. The Pale Warrior's and the Scon tribes of Biperia. The now dead region of Aymara, also claimed by the Kalinda District. Janda. Imperial Miragon, a civilization no more. Valjen of course, formally known as Stalagor. All under her reign."Tay?

"As she obtained each Treasures' essence, she needed less fodder and eventually relied on Ruukaana purely for her Sorcery, and this ultimately led to her final confrontation for the last Treasure of Rule and her wish to permanently extend her lifespan." Bloth jocundly crooned with a spiteful incentive, beaming daggers into the hamstrung Ren.

"The Queen of Valjen deceived the nobility of Qui-Qua as well, through her alias as the Wife of Zuuror Phorlock, shortly before feigning her death. Then Father to your former king of Octopon, King Naeshen Primus. Avadasia saw to it after her wed, Neashen's majesty would be disposed of in a timely manner so she would take the throne by herself, for he was too weak in age and sickness to fight her. Ruukaana became her token, a symbol of Octopon during her reign." Mantus offered on cue, composing a flat shrug.

"Very good, Mantus. Of course our Prince's Father put an end to this ordeal as soon as he found out from the Dignified Zuuror of her trick, of which she was fooling the whole of the twenty seas, but by then the damage had already been fulfilled. Rigel Primus was forced to engage her in battle at sea and take her life. He obtained the throne by ousting his own Mother." Bloth echoed of cunning, a short-tempered laugh soon followed.

"I don't believe you, Bloth. Jenna never told me of such, and My Father would never allow such an act so he could steal Octopon's Crown!" The majestic capture ground his teeth in furor. Spitefully refusing to grant courtesy, he was regretfully a captive audience.

"Surprised at your family scandal? Did you think your heritage was nothing but waves and blue-skies?" The tyrannical cutthroat scoffed. "It's not so simple. You didn't let me finish. It's rude to interrupt, Prince Ren." With a dotting amusement Bhe wrought forth.

"Why? Tell me why. Do you hate anyone who is trying to stop you? I don't know what my Father did, but I know it was for the best." Ren failed to listen, he muted his resentment.

"Hate?" Bloth genuinely smiled. "I just desire what is mine." He gleamed like a boisterous shark. "Why? Jenna lied to you, Boy. It was covered, but all of Daddy's trustees certainly knew. For Avadasia was too powerful a foe to your King after having Twelve of the Thirteen Treasures. I'm sure you've been told that the Black Tide was the source of the Dark Water. This is true, but the Globe's crust was not split into a rift until after your Father's battle. Avadasia, in her attempt to retaliate transformed herself into a gliding Goija and swallowed the Thirteenth Treasure from your Father. When she converted back to her human shape however, she made a mistake and failed to transform herself into a tidal-twister to swallow him. She used too much of the Abysmal Element in the spell to enhance her Power and not enough Living Substance so she was corroded into a demon. Inside her new presence, she tried once more to sink the King's Armada but he instead trapped her by making her fall into a whirlpool of her own making. From then on, Avadasia disappeared, and the Treasures she possessed, Scattered. One liquefied into a source of Pure Life at the North Pole...or maybe above Arakna Isle. Of course, no one has ever seen that one." Bloth tersely told of a past account under unequivocal earnestness, not sparing any minor detail.

"So if she craved to possess the world and failed, My Father did nothing wrong...He was only trying to stop her reign before she could ruin the life of foreign nations." Ren continued to rationalize, glaring up waveringly at the sound and pacing foe.

"No. Though she did despise anyone who was different from her, world-domination was not her wish. Avadasia never cared for any of the affected children she left behind." Bloth settled in pitch as he carried forward. He peered down at Mantus to his side, who looked up at him with admiration, or alternatively envy.

"She began her alchemy because she didn't appreciate her...ogrelike appearance. From then on, she was successful with her burdensome aspirations. She desired youth, but most of all, she wished to avoid her own death. She Crowned herself the last of her executed race with her firstborn Son so that no one else would be able to attain the Abysmal Element. In lieu of sparing her life alone, she promised to share her immortal secrets with her Darling boy. Want to know the tragedy, Ren? Avadasia's dark and dreary path could have been stopped, but it was this...Indestructible Boy's Father, who refused to help her claim an endless existence. Using the Treasures to defy Kuunda, was of course unheard of for King Primus." He stalked about the stone confine as he plagued the victim of his tale. Bloth yanked a tormenting pull on Ren's lock, and let go as soon as he landed a yelp from the youngster.

"How do you know this?" Ren relented to the truth with a begging search for reason.

"Is it any surprise, Ren, that my mother was not faithful to the King of Stalagor?" Bloth's smiting menace contorted to one entirely venomous. He smirked as he watched the prince's remaining glow rack with a flooding spasm.

"This prince has seen his fair share of Octopian wenches, Son of Primus." Mantus supplied with a hoarse vaunt.

"You shouldn't even be siding with him!" Ren nettled over the narrow saboteur's detrimental loyalty. He swerved toward the accompanying Mantus by as much as he could will his body.

"Bloth's penalties aren't stacked on those for high-treason against the Zuuror of Qui-Qua. My number of piracy crimes are great. The insignificant deserve to be stolen from and raided." The commander idly badgered the determined royal.

"No! You're both wrong! Let me go, and I'll prove it to you..." Ren was now virtually pleading to be set free. His courage was groveling within the frustrating binds that for once, he could not outsmart.

"Then you will be adequately surprised when I say that I was by my Mother's side when she fought your Father in the fogweed of Aymara, the fist breach of the Dark Water. How did I know King Primus would return to the surrounding sea-field later on? Call the Maelstrom a...family heirloom. Construction of a Leviathon is a lot easier when you are another leviathan." Bloth trickled with a gale of pure splendor.

"I never fancied you a momma's boy." Ren seriously commentated. He saluted with a blink of seacrystal flare and traced the unwieldy charlatan throughout the room with his eyes until Bloth slunk to a rest.

Bloth uprightly snubbed. "Nothing of the like. I have no need for cheap materials like Ruukaana when I will possess the Treasures of Rule." The enormous marauder fiercely asserted his ambition, no leak or doubt in his final and steadfast statement.

"So you want to blindly follow in her path?" Ren tried to display the faults in Bloth's motivation.

"I once considered letting you claim the Treasures of Rule, do you know, Boy? You saved my life, even though I would have broken your puny bones and gotten rid of you like a jib-eating sea-leech. I don't want the Dark Water to take over Mer any more than you do, Ren, but then I thought about the cost of stepping out of your battle..." Bloth's insidious temper felt warm for one instant. He did not meet a swollen glint directly on Ren, but something about him changed.

"So why didn't you?" The prince was reminded of the time he had saved the Pirate Lord's life from a lagoon of sink-sand on the traveling island of Undaar, but he contemplated what it could do with this caging trample he was suffering.

To Ren's quiet stun, Bloth raised a leer on his blanched eyebrow and shifted a clarion iris above the glass-replacement. Wholeheartedly, he welded his sightline on the relentless boy. "Do you know how long the average lifespan of a Stalagorian native is? How about the Original breed?" The pensive brute drew threateningly close under shredding scrutiny of the hassling do-gooder, who seemed to sense he had somewhere crossed a line he never should have. Bloth scowled at Ren's impending and shrinking morale.

"No." Ren bravely teemed glossing pools up at the massacring vanquisher, for what would be a summer-breeze underneath those lids was dull and worn. He satisfyingly answered Bloth, who may haul off on him in a split instant to take joy in his mishap and for the overt crime of saying the wrong thing.

"210 years." Bloth alleviated his squalor, no longer joking.

"If you allow me to the Treasures, I promise I'll do what I can." Ren slouched as he touched upon a throe of kindness, he professed a supporting stance.

"Do you mean that?" Bloth tilted his head, creeping his words. He jilted his beard between his fingers and coiled it again. He definitely considered but he did not smile.

"As the Prince of Octopon, I give you my Word." Ren nodded understandingly and waited at possibly the longest inactivity he had waded through.

"I'm afraid that's not good enough." Bloth sourly dismantled Ren's prospect.

"Why?" Ren vulgarly jolted at the squelch of his hopes, he immediately sought logic.

"I rather enjoy being King of the Seas." Bloth returned remorselessly. Ren solaced at Bloth's justification, but only somewhat.

"So you have nothing to lose. I do not understand completely, Bloth, but I can't lie to you and promise I'll let you continue to wreak havoc without justice when I become King. It would be no different than what Avadasia has done, begin to understand this. That would not be right. I will make sure to do everything in my power to clear what siege has been caused to Mer." Ren earnestly fought to diverge the vitriolic Conqueror from this path of terror, though he sensed he was not making much of a dint. He uncomfortably clenched his arms, he didn't think he would be moving them any sooner.

"Unfortunately for you, Ren, there's no use for that when I have already won. There's no reason why I should put my plans on hold for the empty promise of a silly Boy. What Avadasia suffered was incomparable to King Primus's inability to hold his promises at holiday Galas." Bloth curbed Ren's attempt on the spot. He egressed with a wheezing grumble and pivoted toward the outlet from the prison, seemingly contented in snickering about Ren's discomfort.

"Wait, Bloth." Ren accomplished one last summon before he would finally be through. He didn't think it would yield any results, but Bloth turned around with a streaked and bitter interest. "I know you're aware the Treasures can do amazing things or you wouldn't continue to seek them, and I know you believe me. I can't say I know every dark and hidden corner of the world like any pirate lord, but if the Treasures of Rule are used selfishly and for Evil, it will kill all life on Mer. This I can promise you. You'll be left alone with the Dark Dweller in a solitary existence, there will be no reason to plunder anymore." He strained with the limited potency his realistic focus would allow him from within the lonely dungeon, and he prayed to Kuunda and every sea-god with a name that it would crack this ice. Bloth granted him the most torturous glower he had ever witnessed the pallid mangle of scars show.

"Ren, what a foolhardy boy you are. Has anyone ever told you of how our race dies? What a pleasant sight it is to behold them when that special day arrives that is determined for all of us? I can't do anything." Bloth marched back around with a horrifying glint in his eye and an acrimony of a thousand murderous nightmares. Ren swore that somewhere, a baby leviathan screamed to it's death.

"No, but I'm sure it will do you good to tell me." Instead of being scared, Ren relaxed and encouraged the spurned Last-of-Legacy. He wouldn't be leaving here today.

"Older and wiser is something that is far from obtainable for us, unless what you consider so is a pile of reef-torn-residue! Your ignorance and heartfelt vows don't offer any assistance in changing the reality of the Stalagorian. You will never experience what it's like to be born with a species-exclusive condition, from Inside it rids itself of...spare parts." In a moment, Bloth's fist was so tight around Ren's neck with a bloodshot rage that if he were mortal, he would be paralyzed below his shoulders.

"What does it feel like?" Ren breathed after pulling away and basking in his viced health. Bloth laid his squashing hand away.

"I imagine it feels like being eaten by a Constrictus." Bloth made a crude and close comparison.

"So that's it." Ren accepted with an anemic rife. "Then I'll help you. I don't know how...but I will." He promised furthermore, he vigilantly tousled with mercy.

"I told you to spare me the morality, boy!" Bloth furiously scraped at the innocent boy with murderous claws, but he preferably stopped and shook madness from his drizzling tremor.

"No matter what choice you take, Bloth, losing your skin to keep fighting is the last thing on Mer for either of us to worry about." Ren assured with an honest glimmer of remembrance. Constrictus

"I do not know how a Treasure of Rule became one with you, or how I should go about obtaining it. When I figure out how to use this fact against you, oh what a terrible existence you will have! You're just a scared Boy, Ren. That's all you'll be." Bloth half-laughed at his captive, smiling fully. He let go of the young man as he reposed. It started to become worrisome when he paused, as if he were contemplating something. He at last gave up and turned away, bidding farewell with a lone eye. "Come, Mantus." Snapping at his battle-strategist was the last thing done before he left the chamber altogether and locked the door.

Mantus was again slow to follow, still remaining in the room only to grin wickedly at the prisoner. He would have left, had it not been for a strange prominence of pale cerulean that emanated from the wall behind Ren and made him turn about. Ren's skylight eyes focused on the eccentric radiance that was discharging from underneath the boundary of confine. Ren secretly smiled.


	15. Cruelty

Chapter 13 EPIC END PART 2

THE SPIRIT - THE CURSE

PART 2 CRUELTY

The cramped chamber would have been gloomy if it had not been flooding with an odd light of beryl.

"By the two moons!" The haggard form in the room clutched a drawn sword in his palm as he jolted a crude bane. "How are you doing that, boy?" Mantus snapped at the restrained man of sallow locks, demanding answer.

"I'm not doing anything, naja-dog!" Ren hardily clashed, facing the evil underling who was harassing him. He did not know what was going on, but By Kuunda, he hoped it would grant him a way out.

Mantus gawked at Ren with broadened eyes for a moment, then he arced away from the boy to gaze at the wall abaft Ren that was strangely glowing with an alien light. "Natchut!" He bit as he swung his blade at the block, which bunged a little too-close to Ren's blond head. It artlessly shook in vibration on the stone and bounced off. "Noy jitat!" The commander cursed, possibly because the impact against the wall would dull his shank.

"Trying to hit me, dartha-eel?" Ren glared at the swordsman who had almost lobbed him in the skull, gritting a perturbed remark.

"No, but now I am!" To Ren's distress, he heard the thief yell and then the blunt part of his edge connected with the prince's head. "You're no help, stupid runt! Quiet your mouth, unless you'd like another!" The disturbed troublemaker lowly barked.

"Mantus, why don't you like Ioz?" Ren refused to settle and bothered moreover.

"Why won't you shut up! His loyalty caused a conflict with that envious traitor of a bar-friend of his." Mantus threw Ren a half-reply, centralizing with cumulating stress on the barrier he was fronting.

"And you were hurt in that conflict." Ren prevailed in his distracting lecture as silence rained over Mantus's orblike wince of brine and steam. "What was it over?" The ransomed prankster pried onward.

"What was it over? What do you think it was over, boy? Gold and possessions." The swindler puffed at the stupid child with bludgeoning superiority. Mantus shifted back to the glistening surface, which was exploding like an aurora. He seemed to be quiet and worried. "Noy borga! I have to tell Lord Bloth!" The minion shouted as he quickly bustled out of the room to catch up with his Master, who was now probably farther away but would not be too far.

Great, Ren thought.

West of the Octopon shore where a lighthouse stood, a dagron coasted down for a landing.

"Show me where he is, Tula!" The aged woman dismounted the beast, gravely motioning to the younger clothed in pink, who was racing beside her. There were no ships in the harbor, neither saw anything.

"Chungo lungo! He's not here!" Tula gloomily cursed, she spied something up in the bastion.

"Go to the lighthouse!" Avagon shouted vigorously. From a far distance away, ships followed along the shoreline where the dagron had berthed. Avagon and Tula climbed the stairwell with Niddler balanced upon Tula's back. When they reached the zenith, they were faced with a mass of Bloth's pirates who were again trying to take Jenna and the lighthouse. Konk and Mantus were absent. "Where is the swordsman and the short pirate?" Avagon compelled as she precipitately needed to pull an advancing bandit's fist, flipping him over with her knee in a martial move. She readied in a fighting stance. She kicked at another foe and then drew her longsword at the brigand aggressor, fending him off.

Tula reeled her scimitar at a crewman of brawny frame who was trying to get at her. "They must be where Ren is!" The ecomancer cried out, disconsolate at the sense. Niddler scratched at the outlaw who was set on attacking Tula, causing him to relinquish his knife and drop over.

"Patience, child! We will find him!" Avagon hollered out to Tula. She sounded a warcry as she vaulted up into the air in a split kick, slamming away two pirates at twain sides of her.

"Speaking of ladyfriends, here's our little possession!" Behind the tinder, a gleeful chuckle jested abound.

"Tula!" The call of a strapping man tossed out on her next. To the epiphany of the two women, Ioz and Zoolie were in the peak platform of the tower, making short work of the henchman. Perceptively, Jenna had been forced into a corner at the advance of a pair of simpletons, until they were bumped away by the barkeep and the ponytailed-buccaneer. "You're late, woman." He vivaciously scolded, following the tavern-skip in wringing up a barging ignoramus by the pantleg.

"Really Ioz? That almost sounded like you didn't want me here." Tula exhaled as she unleashed her wrath on an unlucky raider nearby.

"We could never not want you here, Tula." Normally such a comment from Ioz would be written off as sarcastic, but this time he meant it.

"Look at her go." Zoolie hinted to Ioz as he watched Tula dangerously skid a throwing knife into the wall and slam down another goon. "These kreld-eaters don't have much of an aim!" Zoolie delightfully jived. He hurriedly dodged away from a cutlass, which missed him. The storming thug and the one in accompaniment were pushed through the gaping window frame, the other attempted looter met with a heave of a barrel. The mist became alight with a ship pulling toward the harbor, a frigate treading through the measly patches of obsidian liquid, which were only repelled away from the shores of the lighthouse by the energy within jewels. Zoolie scanned out the open pane at the sight. "I'll go." Without delay he announced, and plowed for the stairwell.

"There, the dartha-eel is." Ioz growled curtly under lumbering breath. "I know what you're after, brother, that doesn't mean I'm letting you do it alone! We're kicking his backside! Tula! Zoolie and I will handle this!" Ioz blasted as he started to reel down the staircase after the pirates in the summit had been beaten. Zoolie tailed soon upon the vanishing shadow of Ioz. Avagon began to protest too late.

"Tula." Avagon keenly directed, twisting to the girl. "I'm going to find Bloth's stronghold. You can tell the crews where I went, but don't tell the pirate or the barkeep! If Bloth has the Sword of Primus, he can go down to the Treasure chamber below!" She invoked the order with severity.

Tula did not exactly agree with this plan. Avagon was going to go out alone and she wanted Ioz and Zoolie to defend the lighthouse until her fleet arrived. "What should I do?" The green-eyed empath questioned the elder.

"You may do whatever you wish!" Avagon instructed as she fought off an emerging heckler who took one last jab at her, she shuffled down the stairs. Tula raced to Jenna in haste, helping her to sprint down the steps. She would need to find a safe place for her. Tula absconded to the outside of the spire and viewed Avagon's ships beginning to trudge to harbor. "Niddler!" She summoned the monkeybird, who chased her down.

"Tula?" Niddler addressed timidly.

"I need you to fly Jenna to Avagon's fleet, she'll be safest there! I need to help Avagon!" Tula critically petitioned on the monkeybird's reluctant protest.

"But Tula, Bloth is out there!" Niddler shrinkingly warned her.

"I know that but Jenna can't defend herself!" Tula's shouted commitment told again. Niddler relented with a nod as he hopped on the lighthouse-keeper's shoulders to aspire her away.

The short road from the lighthouse thudded with footsteps. Ioz and Zoolie scrambled like lightning for the deluge where the craft began to spiral through. The cloud over the stirring point licked and recessed, then it becalmed.

"I doubt it Zoolie. You know he's too unpredictable when he's outside of Bloth's watch, and this isn't the work of someone who slashed and dashed." Ioz evaluated the hatch with fingertips as they ran across dust. The mounds of salt in the Loor district could easily hide any identity.

The dependable manager shrugged. "Maybe he's got another posse following him. Either way, there's no climbing down here." Zoolie loomed over the boggling access-point to one of Octopon's many underground networks. Chipped spikes pierced out of the pounded walls of dirt like that in an excavation shaft. Someone had raided the inside, the evidence was in the uncommon footprints coiling out of the rectangular fortress. Though the recurrent quantity of the wide sets were conspicuously overridden, every marking track in the mud surpassed the tread-impact of Ioz and even of Zoolie.

"Where is the ship going?" Ioz dashed off in a sprint of cornhusk britches as he fixated on the ready hull entering an obscure anchorage. It moored and debarked, but no crew was seen. "You should know what shape Mantus's foot is." He garnered a guess at the unique outline, his compatriot roved with an alarmed reaction to the hypothetical insinuation.

"Mantus is in this and it's no good, he's acting up more than last time. He hasn't settled since back then, it's going to his jitatan-kreld-eating head. I don't know if you've heard of those recent shady-deals in Janda-town with his thieving sport, but it can only be him." Zoolie illustrated with a grave involvement, his confession came after a deft tarry.

"Ay chunga, no surprise. He always was a brooding half-masted lune. Years have passed and if the chance presented, I'd swing that scheming cheat of a gold-grubbing hack across the Twenty-seas once more! Those were the days." Ioz raged but laughed sedately as he caught his breath, ready to mobilize with Zoolie while the shell-armor on their elbows and abdominals chinked. He plugged forward, nearing a tuft of spiny rocks. The avenue extending to the terrace long since dissolved from the horizon.

"I'd join ya, we left that kreld-eater to clean up so much. If this were Janda-town we could play rounds and drink or grapple about how we messed with him in the old days, knowing how Bloth puts the fishhook on 'him daily. If I only tossed him off his bargaining-ledge by that smoky mop of his...our last feast might be different." Zoolie scratched his head for a doubtful trifle on whether chasing an unknown rudder would fill their recent dilemma.

"We'll never know. It's the past, friend. If only we were in Janda-town. No where in fledging Octopon can you find grub and grog that doesn't taste like Drakkle's fare. Jitatan barnacle-salt-I'd rather drink sea-water! Ay-chi-chungo-chuk!" Ioz raved as he noticed a sign reading Salt Dunes Of Loor, he snappily kicked it down.

"Ren's captured and all, kind of kills the mood don't ye think? If it were only Bloth now, we might have more time...To say the least." Zoolie said in serious regard and Ioz nodded dourly. "I won't fear Ren being taken to Janda-town but with meticulous swindler in charge, he'll be swimming in a seafield of trouble soon." The barkeeper communed dryly, muted of virility. The two waited at a halt against the shore of bedlam.

"I'd like to get both him and the degenerate. One jitatan pair they make, it's a full ship with Strand on board." Ioz sharply ventured of bad memories.

"Excuse me?" Zoolie and Ioz jumped to a gawking startle when an outsider summoned them both.

"Who by the two moons are you?" Ioz uncomfortably welcomed the robed wanderer, who was stepping to meet him.

"The name is Kauldron, I believe we have met on some strange moon ago. I work for Mantus, whom you speak of." Kauldron bowed carefully, laying his hands to the margin of his dusky frame.

"Then you're coming with us!" The explorers tore the ground to meet the saboteur with an X of steel, watching him feebly saunter back on knees. Scowls promised action.

"Hold your swords, Zoolie and Ioz. I wish I weren't working for him. May I mention that I am the Sixth known of King Primus's Seven Captains, allow me to elaborate. I'm the Son of Supreme Chieftess Avadasia of Miragon and Kubana of Andorus, who became one of the original settlers of Delpha. I ruled side-by-side with my sister Malu for a short time until our mother tricked me into a deadly trap to take charge with her daughter and to have myself with all the other men exiled with me from the isle for my disobedient knowledge when Mantus began building his own crew in Janda-town and across the four corners of Mer. I was also in connection with Mizar and Phorlock during the time they were imprisoned on the Maelstrom, Teron as well." Kauldron picked up his mannerly brow, disclosing a contrastive agenda.

"How do you know our names?" Ioz arrested his nerviness at the final statement, he and his partner sheathed their blades.

"More than that. I was his trusted. Well, as much as Mantus trusts anyway. For long I've been trying to stop, but I fear he knows everything about me. Now he's becoming so much of a rising problem that Bloth himself may even be concerned with him. I will tell you who else he uses as a spy, if you allow. Also, you should not trust the ship you saw on the shoreline as there are many illusions in Octopon that may plague your senses. I can guarantee you Bloth has no need for salt. He is on the other side of this landmark square, but search here if you like." Kauldron regained his standing. He netted oval pupils on his company amid a discerning clean of his tawny pelt.

"Bloth? Scot pango...No way. Tell us how we get to them. Now." The trembling pant pressed from Ioz's lips, angled and all-ears.

"I'm afraid my worriment may be realistic. I was hoping either of you may have come up with any plan, for as long as he's under Bloth's legion, he is all but indestructible." Kauldron curled his neck to the active ledge with a discreet hesitation, he murmured. Ioz shook negatively. "If you want after his crew, you would be smart to take his trail mark. In Octopon however, you must wait for the ebb of the tide at midnight to reach the Underlevel of the Septopon Canal. It is the easiest channel to take from Loor to the Taikal forest." He foretold a regrettable balance in the water's surface, which would reveal an easier route. The drift rushed between the sandbar and a faraway grotto at the end of Kauldron's fingertip.

"Then we'll wait, but that ship has to be real." Ioz simply phrased his needed intermission of voyage as he pitched his feet through the grainy terrain but quick as he had doubted, the nautical mirage dispersed in a trumpeting gale. Zoolie loafed about in unison. The beach was clarion but there was too much of a current to swim between where he and Zoolie were, and their destination. The gnashing flood would yield to the moon, and it was not time yet. The soil was dry and loose, the two had raced so far inland they could see the shore as a mere strip of cream cutting the sky.

"Bloth and Mantus both have employed magicians to revive their previous sea-craft, the Maelstrom. The frigate you saw disappear in the water is a fake, a trap cast by a Genutani, or a wish-maker, and the one you are in danger of facing. This disastrous project I've been trying to stop but Mantus is fronting the deal. I worked alongside Mantus and Strand for one reason, I needed to be able to move fast enough to the limit of where my ultimate mission would take me. I unwillingly became too involved in the Jewelry Market but I was fortunately only required to export the earnings to minor dinghies. Driven by my own personal goals, I did not pay their figurings any notice but now that the seas are unsuitable to sail I need some assistance with escape. I know my orders under Commander Mantus must not be at all an inspiration to you good men, and I am sorry." Kauldron apologetically fell down on one knee as if he were pleading forgiveness. He arose in silence, waiting at the subjective reception to the wages and ranks of pillagers. Ioz receptively crinkled at the hard mention of the Janda-town Jewelry Market.

"Mantus got that position for his efforts in Octopon, what bilge I never believed. Bloth saw something in the crooked naja-dog. Bloth gets fifty, oh sixty of everything on the Maelstrom, but oh that's a jitatan big forty for his command." Ioz shivered with revulsion. "He's just a little greedy they say, but knowing him off-duty or worse, taken to Janda-town with that fiendish criminal...is a sentence from the rifts of Fezwa's Fire in it's Full. Sometimes not even Vlor will join when it is Mantus's time, if you understand why Bloth rarely sends Strand ashore with him. He raids like he is possessed by jitatan sea-devils themselves. Cleaning dagrons three-moons until grave's daybreak is less gut-wrenching and nerve-wracking." He jolted in tone as he observed the advance of the forthcoming highmoon.

"He's a strategy-maker, no barnacle-weed. There is no strategy to defeating him, at least not one that makes sense. The gambler is a gamble, a living game of reef-roll. The only thing close to beatin' him is sticking him with his own Treatment. Aye, if I hadn't once cheated him outta a gold piece with the help of Ioz and Blue-Lips truly, he could still cheat his way out of a padlocked chain with those gruesome perks he's been appointed to for twelve years since then." The vivid businessman soughed and rifled a fierce beard.

"You know we did the best we could, mate. Mantus this, Bloth that. Treasures and Dark Water. This jitatan Quest, I wish we could share a barrel of Draja-rum and win some coin. Through half this entire wait that is all I've wanted to do, Zoolie?" Ioz requested of his tired accomplice, letting a hankering nod from Zoolie supplant.

"Excuse me, could you say that again?" Kauldron's blinked as he tried for a repeat. Ioz and Zoolie stared him directly in the basalt eyes.

"I said I wish we could share a barrel of ale. You know, down the hatch? Nevermind. Besides, Bloth's men have already drained all the ale in Octopon. Unless you don't care that you're swallowing a wharf-rat's vomit." Ioz brought a chiding blather out of his grinning lips.

"I have heard him refer to the infection Konk devised as Eel-blood Treatment, do you know what this is?" Kauldron connected with an understanding slope of his chin.

"Eel-blood, what a superstition." Ioz distrusted with all reason, he stretched from his seat to his boots. "Eel-blood?" He unfortunately whispered to his counterpart with a thudding elbow, an unpleasant twitch of jet pupils rolled next.

"Aye, you know he hasn't forgotten. Now's the perfect time for him to use it." Zoolie concurred on an unspoken inkling, swashing to Kauldron.

"How did you make it here, Kauldron?" Ioz opened his acquaintance to the absconded messenger.

"Well, I am one of his spies and I departed under this excuse but I'm looking for my life partner above all else. You see that was my ultimate mission. Rumors have said she may be found in the Golden City of El Scorpascia, however I haven't exactly obtained the ability to slip away. Mantus almost did away with all of my family. He believed I told them important things that I certainly did not. I am curious to how your animosity started, he does not speak well of you." Kauldron narrowed a glimpse at the perplexity of the Tayhojian sailor's remark, he slacked to a slouch.

"There is no El Scorpascia underneath Octopon, that is a gada legend but I know what isn't." Ioz could have fluctuated with a sudden and nervous groan as he elapsed to the ground. He made himself at home on the crux of his arms behind his head. "Mantus tried to dispose of me, back when I used to crew for Bloth. Once before, he left Zoolie and I abandoned out in the floor of the Floating Coral Reef. Even for the favorite midshipman, Vlor, he refused to allow us supplies back when all three of us were on the swabbing station. He ordered us out where the fish gathered because we were down on food, and help. Zoolie and I were..." Ioz daydreamed as he displaced his weight from the gravel. Toned lids shut and he relived a time forgotten.

The lumbering waves drizzled the deck of the scrawny scout-ship as a trio of pirates reeled up a saturated haul. Somersaulting fish rolled and rotated inside the net, flapping mouths as the bone-craft creaked. The youngest lad regained the helm at the haste of his companions. Wreckage from a decade tumbled beneath the flares of two burning eyes. The Maelstrom wasn't at all stationary, and soon would devolve into the haze. The shrill probed into the heavens, screams wrecked the world tarnished by the awakening monster.

"He left us stranded at sea with the jitatan Krelikhan. You have never seen a nightmare worse than a double-headed porpoise and thirty-two violent crab-pincers. It makes the Constrictus look like a jib-bat, and we almost didn't make it back. I was steering leeward and Zoolie was able to keep Vlor from falling overboard but thanks to the Eyes of the Fallen Captain of the sky, the scout-ship sunk. We did our part in towing the Maelstrom away from that Reef of horrors, though we lost Bloth's best fleet vessel and all of our fish. It was an error on Mantus's watch, and do you know what the cheap scoundrel did? He claimed be to unable to send a rescue craft for us because he was in the middle of commanding the dagron squadrons back to base. Bloth was nice enough to make us take over both of Strand's dagron-shifts for two months, after we almost lost our lives." Ioz reclined as much as possible. Staring at the tide, he was groused. Zoolie was of the same mind.

"I am sorry to hear of your misfortune. Were I working for him back then I most certainly would have intervened and likely revealed the spot of the coward's wealth for all the crew to take over. So tell me everything, Zoolie and Ioz." Kauldron diligently smiled and denoted his unconditional gratitude.

"You know, maybe I don't need that drink after all...must be something in Octopon's air that feels like a Drajaenain-spring! It's in the past now. Just between us men, eh?" Warmth rimmed Ioz's dispassion, he bumped his new pal a tavern cheer.

"I'd like to hear more about your journey." Static humming stilled the salty party.

The brim around the base of the lighthouse was undisturbed. The enchantress on the path of crag scouted for her quarry.

"Where is Avagon?" Tula baffled herself with the unaided dilemma badgering her mind. The agile warrior had disappeared from her vision quite curiously. She had also lost any sign of her male teammates to the cloudy vapor. "Where could they be?" She fumbled through the fog, continuously ambulatory. This would be a terrible time for her senses to be obscured. She impinged on something in the sky, a terrible evil. Whatever it could be, it could not have been human.

"There she is!" The shrewd laugh from overhead the ground of the station could not be perceived from below. "They won't even have to give me a handicap!" The main voice of three blustered jocundly as the teeming men joined in a chuckle.

"Dive!" The jagged direction came from the stern of a high-sailing apparatus. The pilot was appointed on the top seat and commenced the motion to dip.

"I can't pick up anythin-Noy jitat!" Tula screeched as she was suddenly hauled up into the air by a rope about her midsection. She witnessed a mutation raining down upon her, her eyes focused on what appeared to be huge wings of a butterfly with a rudder and paddles. Below the organic glider she saw, a chair? "Jargis?!" Tula blazed actively, being detained against her will and slung over the shoulder of the former monkeybird-slaver. Jargis had been poised into a grandiose seat, above him sat the recognizable form of Slaggon the Biotransmuter and in back at the paddles, Llorg, fellow monkeybird-trader. "What do you want?!" She hissed with aggression.

"Nothing personal, girlie, but I have a business contact who would love to have you over for dinner!" Jargis eagerly larked as he smiled, he secured the afflicting Tula over his back. Slaggon and Llorg snickered as the device remounted the airway, ecomancer kept as the prize of the journey.

"Who would that be, blustering windbag?" Tula snapped back with resentment.

"I owe a little favor to your friend Commander Mantus!" Jargis compelled a generous answer. Tula was befuddled, she tired to wiggle within the binds.

"Bloth's second-in-command? What does he want? With me?" Tula sizzled with abhorrence and disorientation as she toiled to bail herself. Jargis was too staunch however. Even if she could get loose at this point, it would most likely mean a plunge to her death. She impermanently submitted to her captor.

"I imagine he'll want to take you to Janda-town after Bloth is through with you." Jargis knowledgeably corresponded to the sorceress's query, unfazed and guileless.

"What do you mean, Take Me To Janda-town?" Tula seared with hostility, not liking the sound of that. She cogitated a plot of escape. The cryptic blocking of her ability had ceased the instant she came in contact with the glider. If she could control the wings...

Jargis snorted uncouthly. "You'll find out soon enough! I'm taking some monkeybirds back to Pandaawa for myself! Including your troublemaking friend!" He let out a nasty chuckle, Slaggon and Llorg followed in immoral fashion.

"Not you're not! You won't get Niddler or any monkeybird!" Tula combatively warred, she thrashed against the inflated arm repressing her. She at last began to urge her fingertips toward her temples and shut her eyes. Here would go nothing.

"She's noisy, maybe we can pay her to be quiet!" Llorg offensively guffawed.

"Waste of gold Llorg." Jargis charily responded.

"She has a nice flank, it's too bad we can't have her for ourselves!" The hulk of Llorg's grody embodiment obscenely made scandalous note and checked out the merchandise for himself with a smelly palm. Tula seethed and hollered, her attention desecrated. She tried again.

"Oh don't you worry, Mantus will whip you into line." Tula's concentration was temporarily faltered by the one unpleasant line via Jargis and the festival of merriment that ensued after. She regained her composure and again began to formulate her byway out. The butterfly's presence filled her mind...

Hidden from the high skies of Mer, three voyagers paced about as the tide gently dropped below sea-level. The cryptic chasm at the floor of the sandbed was screened by a protective heap of stone and coral. Starfish frolicked in the current's crest.

"Life could have been rougher, cargo-boating is more dry than piracy and ten shots as likely to earn you a favor from a sea-beast. The rest of Ren's family were taken by pirates from the South Pole the very day he was born, lost his mother the year after and no one knew what happened to his twin brothers. His sister is worse than mine, 'Mant probably thinks she's one of my port-wenches. The Dark Water came from the seas after the Valjen raids started on Octopon, which was why Primus set out and his son gets his rum for life searching for these chungan Treasures. That lad has more bone than he looks." Ioz bragged with a giddy guff.

"Speaking of dry, Ioz...is it common for Loor's air to taste like suds?" Zoolie sleepily perked his lip from a puff of balmy cheeks.

"Loor? Loor?! Zoolie, the last time we were here the taverns were full and we danced the Janda-Town-Jig at Loor until board! Or was it on Bentar? I don't remember...but that was a wild night! Graff had to drag us back...and he hid us in a hawsehole so Blue-Lips wouldn't chain us to the dagron-hatch. You know the Janda-Town-Jig, mate? Aye-ayeh! We come into port for fame and dame-cheating so if you don't like our game then you better raise me a glug to forget my name or...by my sword! When sun's over yardarm on our cabin-crib the slugs will be eating, so pour me a mug for my faraway maiden in...Janda-town!" Ioz loudly burst as his mood tampered into silliness. When he hopped on one riled leg but failed to correctly prance he toppled over a chunk of dirt.

"Right. So this was how it ended ugly for you?" The graceful sympathizer conferred without skepticism.

"Partially, but Bloth used my old-man and tossed him aside to rot while I was below his mast. After Raymit's loss at the swords, I paid my way back to my native island, alone. I considered staying on my slain father's honor as he would have wanted, but the unlucky rumors of our sea-bound neighbor, Z.M.Q., going about tenfold in every town in Tayhoj were not good news for a retired Bloth-pirate." The continuity of Ioz's story declined but his tormented spirit remained long.

"Because Z.M.Q. carves his dirty work on his treasures or the arms of his minions, I do not think it is completely impossible to track the man behind the Faceless-Pirate's marking, but only if taken from his lone trustee, Mantus. I had heard of the jewelry trades between these bad men when Commander Mantus began building his own crew in Janda-town and across the four corners of Mer. I have to congratulate you. Zoolie, on your escape." Kauldron's eyes wobbled as he broached a shy quandary from a decade gone.

"Haha, as if I would let some incognito dock-kook cut his initials into me good greetin'-swing. Kuunda's Fortune, Z.M.Q.'s darva-rats tried to slip one over on me back when I was a trim ladies'man like Ioz. Me chum never lost his way, but he's a little heavy to dance like a change-girl. Just like ye, I can tell." With a stable chuckle Zoolie admired his indigo brassard, the quiver armband would not complete the entire insignia. He buffed Kauldron a punch between men. "You're alright with me, traveler. Aye. If we're all on our feet tomorrow ye should visit me Gamehouse in Janda-town, should you ever be in the neighborhood to pull up a stool. Tell 'em Zoolie's Honor, and they'll take care of ye." Zoolie gladly shook the maverick's arm with an approving sound.

"On Raymit's blood and my own, I swore my business at sea was unfinished. So, I became one of Bloth's again, though it made me ill all the while." Ioz addled further onto bygone ails.

"Ioz, I commend you on loyalty to your peers. In the Market where jewelry is the only necessity the conquered wearers often meet a different fate during Maelstrom raids at the arms of their captors, especially under Mantus's direction." Kauldron crossed his arms, joining the remount of his new allies as he provided a shape to his saga.

"Yes Kauldron, 'Mant is the wrong breed of seadog to tell about a childhood accident of gold and dark water. The dangers of the sea aren't the first thing you think of when you have a little sister who follows you everywhere, my mistake was opening my jitatan mouth. When we ported at Tayhoj and as she hurried skipping for me to protect her from the shells buried in our island's sands, he asked me whether the woman was my former shipmate. Solia grew up how mother wished but I was still a pirate at heart, so I stayed at every dive and gamehouse until I couldn't take it any longer. I was seventeen then and sister made me promise to stay or she would run off, but I lied and told her I'd see her in the morning. So, she went back to bed. Then I made sure I was the last to board with Sleaze-heart." Ioz rued over tales of his family. His instinct stopped on his younger sister, and there it stayed.

"Ioz was right to set sail from the first port on Tayhoj. If you know how hard it is to steal from Mantus, then you know how hard it is to get his woman away from him. I can't tell you all I saw from his wicked tidings with my Kayrn' because I'm an honest skip, but he and Captain Yellow-eye deserve Kuunda's fist." Zoolie brashly hinted, solemnly he mused in regard. Ioz peered at him in edging concern.

"You never talk about your woman outside of place, might as well keep it that way." The dark-eyed compatriot conveyed to his bestfriend with a easement carrying dry severity. "It's embarrassing. Of all times, we don't need to talk about this now, no reason to bring light to that tragedy." Ioz suddenly diverted. Sad and almost inaudible, his inflection aired.

"I don't see why not. We're about to give up Kuunda's Ghost for this Quest, might as well do it with meaning." Zoolie rattled in. "And her calamity, it's mine, but I often don't have to. There is no finding her, it was like she just flew in those waves. Besides we can trust this mate, right?" The red-haired tavernowner muttered emptily while staring out into the darkened sea.

"You know there was no need. She was lucky to be allowed to foot unshackled during the life we knew her in, the 'Jewelry would have broken her the very sunset she became a loss." Ioz determinately stated, stern as well as cynical.

"He never owned the dirty right to-" Zoolie wandered on.

"Who?" Kauldron drew genuine interest.

"Zoolie's sea-flora, Commander's restless recruit...her place on the Maelstrom was nothing more but a pretty sea-circus for he and Captain Kreld-blood. After Bloth's throwing arm cleaned ship I would have been reassigned with my best-deckmate's station, instead of her...but no." The ebony treasure-hunter's backward scold was seen, but he patted Zoolie's back. "Those promises he made to her to free the crippled brigman were understandably tempting but of course they would be unfulfilled. Mizar had two left boots and Mantus's win streak on bets is still fullsail double-reefs, in his favor." Ioz patiently uttered, his voice dampened.

The drifter parallel rounded away from a haze, he almost ignored the comment of his friend. "No, Ioz. I warned her what a fiend he is. Mantus saw easy prey. Aye Kayraadin, she always made the sun brighter on a place like the Maelstrom, and glowed only for me. Only limit was the sea for us...just a jitatan shame, pal." Zoolie tensely recollected.

"Excuse me, did I hear you right? Did you say she glowed?" Kauldron delayed the colleagues from the middle of their narrative.

"Aye, ye heard me right. She glowed. 'Like high-noon's sun." Zoolie didn't stutter, he dug a glance at the studious man.

The following moment Kauldron held an astounded vigilance. "So what did he do?" The servile agent coveted more detail.

"Complicated." With one sound Ioz dismissed the need to talk.

"Most things are." Kauldron smugly toughened up to the task, he wasn't swayed.

"That's no smooth answer, Kauldron. She was worse than a spineless trade because she wanted to be one of the men." The inhibited pirate removed his suspicion from a retentive trance. From the shade of his topknot Ioz spotted the boiling bubbles in the breaking ocean, starfish swooshed past as Kauldron and Zoolie lent ears.

"Well Kauldron, friend, if I told ye everything the darva-worm did to me, heh, well I'd guarantee you wanna use 'em for an anchor. From the beginning Kayraadin, my lass, showed up as a stow-boy and barely grown eighteen-clams. Bloth was going to dispose of her but I was in high-place and we were scarce on new recruits, so I talked him outta it. I showed her the ropes and kept after her short-lived because 'soon as Mantus found out she wanted to bargain with the Captain over someone kept in the Maelstrom's brig, he slowly but cleverly ruined her by playing a lifelong bet." Zoolie cleared his throat with a burb and simplified his version.

"Kayraa, too much of a fair lady for her own good, even on her arrival, if I can remember. Sadly, her only appeal was a lure and her purpose an incentive to make one of Bloth's brig-residents squeal on King Primus. Mantus appealed to her by training, for a better rank than the chump-change and hardship of menial labor that she suffered sweating through on deck. The old sea-snake, Bloth, pays well but what only matters is if you keep it. Mantus is always looking for a bet, and has many willing but none of them see it all the time like his special lackey...If you know Mantus, you know it's impossible to win a game against him." Ioz concluded illy.

"I wouldn't have let her play the original bet to begin, but her courage was admirable. I sympathized and would have done the same jitatan thing as her for my Ebronian Old' man's sake. The smithin' vodelinger is ever stingy but I respect steel-beatin' Goldone from the arms' shop as my Paps always, like Kayrn' did her scholarly Mizar. Unlike 'them both, Mantus made Kayrn' actually more needy to him after each wager than the bravery that helped her accept his deal from the start allowed. With him always there and offering his boatload of spoils, it was then a raving monsoon to try to protect a maiden who was practically family from crushed hope of Mantus's deceit." Zoolie expanded upon Ioz's rocky judgment but wistfully frowned.

"His deception-ploy was never justified, of course, but she never did refuse him and she easily never owned a single piece of gold Bloth gave her afterwards. Zoolie and Mantus were matchless thieves at the blade's edge, always trouble at end of each watch or always trouble in Maars's tavern as it would be for them. Any gold Zoolie has ever won was in a fair fight. Mantus was the one exception to his rule. Well...he was a no-good navigator to her." Ioz constantly stared at Zoolie with an edgy unrest.

"It was just a little while after Mantus was giving her the daily smack because he listens to Bloth all moon and sun, that she stole from him then entrusted me with that cursed secret...the one I couldn't keep." Zoolie hiccuped troublesomely, he quelled a yawn.

"Of course he gets tired of taking orders, and you know who pays for it. Nothing suffers like a trained dagron." Ioz crassly breezed.

"Dagrons. Wingless." Zoolie uttered grimly the one connecting word with revulsion. "Anyone he lets him play with is one sorry soul, alive or...almost dead. Revenge on a snake, my old friend, like beating him at his own game, and he plays one called deceit. I didn't guess it could be worse to cheat a cheat, especially the one with a heart of black. Anyone owned by Mantus, well she better pray to meet Kuunda in a timely moon. He who is, better pray he can guard his drabuls. Tuk's been a delightful busfolk at the gamehouse, thankful little guy he is." Zoolie duly offered.

"'Mant' doesn't like to be betrayed, especially by someone he believed was his. So Zoolie lent her a hand, but Mantus didn't appreciate the assistance of any...Heroes. So, it became a maneuver-game, and may the most cunning Maelstrom-cheapskate win. Just like what the Janda-town barkeep warned him about, Zoolie's rivalry backfired." Ioz revealed with a sense to his stalwart comrade, he jostled his arms from their resting position behind his shoulders.

"Aye, but if anyone but Ioz'and barkeep only knew how it escalated to more than a scrimpy tavern-match with him...The worst seafaring shardfish, if there ever was one. I tell ye, Ioz, sure as Daven's beard going to Captain Bloth about...it was the biggest jitatan mistake I ever could've made, thinking he wouldn't grant the tramp those brutal requests to pour down The Treatment on her...I would accept even Starfish-Baiting for her, if you can understand my scheme. Me, not her. The lousy scant sticks it on some lower-mate next as I had figured, but not who it would have been." Zoolie huffed and knelt down to sit, he waited for the dim flare of silver to reach a peak.

"Unfortunately, the cruddy privileges on the twenty seas too brutal for Bloth are almost next to none when there are resources to gain. Namely, clues about Treasures he had yet to find a lead on." Ioz keenly argued, his ferocious temper wasn't faring well to former drudgeries.

"If Mantus had honored our bet when he chanced on that piece Karyn' would have been freed from his hands long ago, impossible already but I didn't help. I was a fool, I actually thought I would pay the penalty for her theft. How wrong I was...I knew he would try to avert the blame and that he did, except he knew I wanted it that way. When Kayrn' entrusted me with Mizar's jitatan map it would have earned her a cat'o but by Evil Fogweed, my lass and my ocean couldn't sink any faster, he craved to have his revenge." Zoolie murmured in almost depressive slur of tongue.

"Putting your life on the line for your loved ones is very noble of you, but I suppose Zoolie's sacrifice failed." Kauldron gathered scanning sight on the belching giant, musing attentively.

"Sure it did. Men are disposable to Bloth, 'Mant, not so much. Because of the bloodbath Blue-Lips knows his price. Of course Zoolie didn't want his woman to suffer forever at slime-bag's lash. The most agonizing punishment results for anyone who steals the most illegible bilge from he or Blue-Lips but as for Kayraa...it was such a trivial price for a Quin pirate, who has a billion gold buried somewhere under the shadow-moon and...we don't really know why he went so far with what he did back then. For 'Mant, it made no sense. I never imagined throwing the girl into the pit could have been an act of mercy by comparison, but somehow...Mantus managed." Stillness dissolved in Ioz's unsolvable quandary.

"It was the Moonsail Festival that night and the last raid on Octopon. Unprepared I was to act fast enough, if there was another chance I would ignore orders after he and my girl both walked to the brig for inspection. Even when Bloth was victorious, he'd lost so many of his crew to the defending city. Bloth was roaring over his released prisoner and that didn't help his senses, because Bloth was resolutely convinced she committed Disloyalty...after...the Shade set her up. There is only one punishment for...that." Zoolie painfully remembered, he trembled and clenched his fist as if he struggled with emotion.

"Mantus." Ioz filled in the blank, he became faint. "Thumbbites Treatment. Is only the biggest fault he ever made as Captain because only the most barbaric kreld-eater of the eight angry-wonders can dream up that vile punishment, and it wasn't Bloth. Bloth was too angry. My stomach churns for the poor woman alone." Kauldron's nose twitched under a surprised impression of Ioz.

"I can still hear her calling my name from the ocean...even after...her legs were in tatters like a silk-screen of kelp-pulp. Somehow..." Zoolie whistled over the sea and Kauldron halted.

"Not even Bloth likes to speak of that day, and not because he didn't enjoy seeing her destroyed but because the Constrictus suited him just fine for ridding himself of them. Instead he delighted in sealing her unjust end to that, vulture. There was definitely no need to employ...Mantus's surreal strategics. Not then." Ioz sweat to drown the picture of Mantus's meanness from his vision but his will crashed, by any means he could not.

"Wait a moment...Thumbbites Treatment I have heard of, but I know there's nothing surreal about it. It's simply bugs within a pistol, harsh infection used for a brigman's interrogation, but not deadly to the touch. I could see it being used over Mizar's escape, if on her watch she was faulted by unchaining him." Kauldron shrugged presently, if any metaphorical or literal bother he knew of suggested Thumbbites was worse than any other agony, then he would have to admit to it. His concept of a barrage with swamp bugs did not seem worse than being eaten alive.

"I wouldn't face his version of Thumbbites with a forty-link chain. No sea-maid knows it like her, and she did admit to unchaining Mizar and everything she was not at fault for that morning. If you could ask Kayraa, she would have been tied to the mast for days on end, or used for swordsmanship...Anything else but Thumbbites." Ioz cautioned Kauldron with a potent zeal. He trekked forward to the parted aisle of ocean made by the central moon.

"So you do remember everything that happened. What these maps, why would Commander Mantus take payback on her for she gave you, Zoolie, when it was you who challenged him constantly? I'm astonished by your detail, but what did become of Kayraadin and my employer then?" Kauldron pried for more.

"Maps? More like bilge, they reeked of amber and leech-silt. Worthless. What Mantus put Kayraadin through should have finished her there, but Zoolie and I say he couldn't break her soul even after she passed by the board. There are no bounds for what is done in desperation, for the same reason Zoolie snitched on him. We acted." Ioz asserted with dual displeasure, his mood careened between reckless fervor and frivolity as he hurled knuckles to a passing bug.

"I was told to believe the only lady-pirate to ever sail with him on the Maelstrom bore his son during the Moonsail Festival, but I never knew her name. What a misled counterpart must have endured." On the sand Kauldron swayed his assumption between the reserved group, allowing a coolness to pass over.

"Mantus never bred a son, and he won't because his possibility of being welcomed by Quin brides was charred to cinders. None of these rumors have any land, Kauldron. The worst I ever did was threaten to throw a woman overboard, but Mantus reeks evil from his blood. He blames Zoolie for most of it now, especially the blazing spar that cracked the moment after. Now, he's come back to haunt me." Ioz paid heed to look back, a stony expression was spread on his faded profile.

"The finger points at the two moons, the fool does not look at the fingertip of the past. Twelve years ago, you righted a wrong and a greater evil rose up from the dust. Correct?" Kauldron turned to determine a hunch behind the wayward opinion.

"Kauldron, friend, you know what it's like to be a man. His people...measure only in beards." Ioz tactfully retold with a displeased uncertainty.

"Wait...this is about gold, women, and...beards?" In that time Zoolie was disheartened, the violently blamed stuck like slime in his gut.

Under a sky of volatile clouds the ocean's tide drew back to it's origin. The surface over broken boards of an abandoned salt-stock in Octopon was lined with a stunted heap of stalky wranglers, all gathered around an exalted leader.

"Hail Zuuror Mantus! For our rebirth! We'll follow Zuuror until we die!" The people clustered in humble mobs, raising fists of four fingers to the breeze.

"Qui-Qua's colonies will ascend to the ranks of Mer once more, from Octopon's district of Loor to the end of the seas we will live!" Cries of hope creaked from a soldier among one of the many Quin refugees.

"Mak Toi! We will rise again, once we have the Treasure of Rule for ourselves. When I reclaim my rightful place I will bring power to the Protectors of the North. We will bring as many foreign wench-fare and traders into our cities as we have need for...with our new help." Mantus evenly contented the spindly spectators as he balanced on a stage of salt, high above the rest. "Now..." He flexed his arm to the solitary side, there from the brinks of the desolate plain tromped a band of mule pirates. Surmounting physiques overshadowed the lesser aliens, every Quin man in the resistance drew loathsome gasps.

"About time these smool-brained Beard-loopers paid reverence to Mer's Mother Isle of Valjen, one day they just may keep all their ugly bones. Quin-rib barrels are out of style this year, so pray on your four toes to your Protectors of Lazy that retro-bowsprits don't return too." Tyday scoffed as she vociferously hectored a snarling mess of slender fellows with her bistered company.

"What?! We're not allying with them, forget it! They killed my father and made my mother suffer! They kept us in the Ruukaana mines to pay off their impossible demands! Never forget, Guuda-bay! You're gada nuts! Just like your darva-blooded ancestors...Zuuror my dead-spine, Naja-Mantus!" The uprising against the cheapskate's irrational move began and did not quell until all the rioting tribesmen had walked away and left. After the last insectoid civilian dragged away a flesh-gowned woman who called sire with a lithe newborn, Mantus skid over a hollow's passage with his plan at the forefront. The trail to the Wave and Captain Bloth was drawn before him.

Jazhea straddled through the salt wash as she supported herself with the crux of two pine crooks, such made suitable crutches for the hollow sore that had formed over what were healthy legs. Empty irises lurked with her senseless smile while she strangled the inanimate life out of a common Ewegoose. The leggy mammal never did desire to hurt her but the bottommost spikes where the aging tracks of the Valjen lie above would gain a new set of flight bones in that instant. The splat ended in the puddles beneath the Salt Dunes and an insane laugh limped away with it's royal owner as the animal died in the excavation shaft at her crazy whim. Faintly, the lame mortal stopped in front of a pair of grieving recluses.

"Maybe if we hadn't told him to get lost from our home village he would have turned out better." Mellowed the laments of a soft follower.

"Mantus was given his chance for a different heart when he tried to return our settlement of Qui-Qua's disbanded. Of course I wasn't going to tell him where the Chronicles of Octopon were when I could not find them. The only reason he traveled to Kalinda was because Mizar and someone from our refuge gave him a clue about what may be found with our knowledge, a way to permanently assert his violence over us. He solved his debacle by ordering me lifted as a slave so he could take me aboard and force me to further shore-train his evil way, as I did when he was yet a man." Justifications from a stricter scholar expressed.

"What if you gave him the tiara and jewelry you buried here for me and let him do as he wished with your grant, if only he does not hurt daybreak's Amiss?" The sheltered aide proposed as the hood enfolded the face underneath, a middle-aged woman pondered what would settle such a terrible squall.

"It is no less than difficult when evil is set in motion, and he has already been to the lighthouse I can see. If Bloth is here, so will he be. If he is not playing the loyal soldier, then he's playing the hunter on Ioz." Grunts of stress mounted on the old one's shaggy chin as the duo searched.

"Zoolie's alliance with the metal-claw should help protect Ioz like I predicted...maybe it won't. Unfortunately Mantus's most strategic move will be his last..." The feminine seeker drew a troubled conclusion upon remembering the stars' alignment. So far in opposition from Toishuok they were, she gasped and sunk her breath.

"He is a greedy fool, his stratagems often expose the solid words of another man's Truth. I knew to save you from the penalty for treason only by your personal memo. It is an awful day for an honest soul when my sea-flora is judged to prison by a treasonist himself, I, forced in the time of invasion to confront my own student...and so much more. We were blessed in the state of your arrest Mantus did not learn from what I taught him, when it is necessary to hide the Tru-" With a fatigued lid the white-scalped knight no more than flinched at the sibyl's forecast but he hid his self-doubt under tried endurance, frustrated at his once failure of competence and fall from grace.

"I never meant it to be in the way." Apologies bustled quickly from the servant. The gentry instructor sighed and tilted his neck.

"Recently, someone from our old village confronted me. Surprising, as I am still considered a corruptible legacy by some. Do you know who it was? Young brother looking for two sisters attacked by pirates, Lus-nayi and Joiquiva he said were their names. I was honored by his request, I told him I would do all in my power to return them safely." The legionary mettled as he plucked a written will from a gold earring, the lost man's name had rubbed off on the sand within days of it being inscribed.

"I am honored to have helped Mizar and his family escape when we were taken in the Valjen raid in Octopon and also to care for them at our settlement, sadly only to be captured once more by Bloth and return with us for the future moon..." Fickle detachment from past mischief had already played on her antsy temperament but with a sense of pride and accomplishment for her gains and losses, the shy lady smiled.

"Bloth was not blamed for the Valjen raid because while they attacked he was innocently looking for information, but I fought him on that schooner alongside half-ecomancer, Vaecusa, when Avadasia lured prince Primus out to sea. So, to say he is not responsible is gantha-bilge! Vaecusa insisted on coming along with us because she sensed trouble, but it stopped her not from being wounded in the conflict and hurt enough by those eels so the Good Prince needed to beg her to return to shore...poor fair-one. I didn't realize my role in challenging Avadasia's illusion sooner, how I regret." Sedge bent at the bid of a heart-break-inspired leap, the protective authority of the alliance cast a neatly frazzled mane over his headdress. He remembered everything from the days he and Primus combined their potentials to protect every country of Mer from evil forces. Beginning with their accidental meeting at Qui-Qua and during the days when they called themselves friends, this scholar had known the loyalest man who was destined to be the greatest King of Octopon.

"My only regret is I was only able to rescue Mizar and his scrolls in a fast manner, not his daughter. I wish I could have predicted timely when Mantus was on the Maelstrom. If only, before Bloth returned from the Moonsail festival's raid on Octopon or after the sentence was due. I never wanted to find out about brother's misdeed...I don't think Ioz knew Bloth sparred him...until he and Ioz crossed blades. I wouldn't doubt Ioz doesn't know a child of the Zuuror helped him escape from Bloth and Mantus, either." The hidden follower echoed in her tender Quin-accent. Her mourning was for an accident she could not retract, like she could not take away the stones from the bottom of the sea.

"Your only regret? Your Common speech is improving, but you forget Mizar's knowledge was far more valuable than mine. You do not know regret when you have not lost a single life at your mistake." The honest charge of her guide threw the younger listener off her mark, strictness and rigid teachings swallowed his tone.

"I'm your loyal squire, remember? I was looking for my yahil at the time, you. I didn't know you were given that invitation to Octopon's Moonsail Festival. You have rescued me, so it is right that I will rescue you." The boldness of devotion glided through the willowing apprentice, she focused on her master's gray-eyes but he did not return her definition of righteousness.

"By rescuing me from the Maelstrom after three years of enslavement and choosing to take Mizar with you another day, you unknowingly put Jazhea at risk when the letter forgery of King Primus's seal was received to me. Your skills on dagron-back are superb, you are older and wiser than my dishonorable son but still a foolish child in these situations. Things are not always as they seem, so have regard before you act. I warn you my years are short to the years Bloth may gain should he bereave Ren's upper-hand, think of your higher purpose." Full virtue delved from the very core set the Quin knight's yearning in focus.

"My purpose...I thought it was to save the innocent, as you, yahil. Is it not good what I have done?" She insisted otherwise as though her presence was having no more importance than a graceful bystander.

"Do you know what it is like, sea-flora, to be the sole Defender left of your countrymen with his dignity still intact on the ground of an enemy raid. Overwhelmed by guilt at the riches and women taken, and the families you were given to protect now in poverty because of your authorized errors in judgment. You contemplate life with a vial and three swords at rest, and to know the only reason you and those people live is because of a divine act of mercy. I said those foolish words before I saw King Primus's ship on the horizon, felt them from the bottom of me. Kuunda, ayi makro yoira toivak. Kuunda, I don't want life. Do you know when you have no purpose?" The sage rebuked his wits. The noble's mantle of a green star donned the back of a crest tied on the peak of his hair. He wore the symbol of his status as an Elite and a lifelong pupil of Toishuok, God of the Polar Star.

"No, I don't." The timid student sadly admitted what was laid on heart and mind, sidestepping to secure two blades for the expedition. "It wasn't your fault, yahil, you made sure all the workers' lives were accounted for." She garnered her sympathy to console the straying authority, optimistic and grateful for all he had held her through.

"No, child. Though there are few of us who follow the teachings of Truth, our good still lives on. I tried to create the best land I could imagine but people are many and I am but one, old values die hard. The Valjen knew what they could extract from us. My actions could have been avoided, if it were not for my promise to Mantus's mother. I would never have the strength and steel will of your grandfather in our Island's matters. Your yahil did not deserve Her, or Her polar glory." The twang of disgrace could certainly smash a gentle person's desire when the stern boots quit their hiking flow, she eased from service at his ill sign.

"I am sorry, yahil. It is difficult for me to understand the concerns of the world because I have never been with a man. I broke off my arrangement on your blessing, because of our Island's affliction. Where you go I will go, and where you stay I will stay." The gathering of a man's robes rustled on an attendant's skinny legs as she walked one step behind the elder.

"I know, Saytai, and I never would have thought less of you if you had not devoted your life to serving my interest to protect the few remaining descendants of our people. Good Prince Primus was noble as you before he became King, I owe him most for our lives and his assistance in stopping the trade of Ruukaana back when Qui-Qua's honor still stood. Now we need to find our mark and hopefully stop Bloth from exploiting the Treasures in his possession. By misfortune Octopon has become a-" The wise one feebly gandered at a rising disturbance so close but too far to intercept, he spurned the angering scene with a crease to his flying brow.

"Pirates' playground...of death." Saytai whispered a crushing metaphor as she scoured the sorrowful landscape.

Bestial plays around pyres endured with evasive civilians as savage crews frolicked on a Mer blanketed in black. The gulf forebode but an intrusive pirate wandered too far from camp on shore, hearing a burbling music from the depths of full surf. Twilight in the decaying Octopon splayed the blood lines in his traumatized pupils as the darkness pulled him under, the misfit of the Valjen brutes was snuffed out from soul and youth. Jazhea tiptoed mindlessly for the void off the lighthouse bank until an unexpected fighter stopped her trek.

"I've missed you so much, but I haven't seen so much trouble since I went to sea with your father and was wounded by Avadasia! You need to retreat or you'll be hurt out here!" The warrior on the crust of the shore tightly embraced a younger with golden plaits, smiling and rejoicing with longing reunion but sternly rejecting any deviation. She placated the havoc-conch at her side, having already signaled the cry for movement. Jazhea, in her sickness, could do no better than to tear away when she tried to speak.

"Mantus invite Mizar Moonsail festival and...cousin go free, back to Vaecusa you! If Kayraadin sign letter in King Primus's name...or Z.M.Q.! Help Ioz I need! Hives! The hives!" Jazhea unhappily yanked away from the caretaker, sputtering with deafening aversion as the pain flickered her blind.

"What? What are you talking about? Jazhea, where is dear Xilk? I remember how you ran away as soon as I left home and stopped burying yourself in your dagron studies. Don't tell me you lost interest in him, I assumed you darlings would become a close match. Only on my strictly verboten terms, of course." The orange-eyed battler released Jazhea and patted her shoulder with a poisonous umbrage.

"Yahil, she's a danger!" Another cultivated defector soon petitioned, a restless glare unsettled. Saytai dashed to her yahil's guardianship, but didn't approach Kyanna too rapidly.

"I'll take her there, Vaecusa. She's already known sink and sabotage ever since Beesall's Compass-fragment lured her to her capture, and I think she's been helpless enough through another Moonsail's eve. Why not let Jazhea do something worthwhile for herself and for someone else? She won't listen otherwise, like I didn't." Behind the armor-clad matron of the Imbiber village, a sable compatriot of Ioz springing upon a single heel urged Vaecusa to relinquish control.

"Vaecusa? It's Kyanna of the Leviathan Worshipers. Are you sure you can fly a dagron when you can hardly rove on the ground, little miss?" Kyanna disputed with a ornery scrutiny to suspect the girl's impulses. One tottering crook lurked from a root base, producing a short cutlass.

"Oh sure, my older brother flies them all the time. By the way, I'm twenty-five. This limp? It's nothing, I'd be faster with another boot." Solia spelled her decision nonchalantly and then latched onto the dagron.

From out of the woodwork, a sickened pirate vaulted for Solia and Jazhea in an unlucky slip at conquering both girls. The rascal of Valjen's pestilence landed his fat arms underneath Vaecusa's sandal. Ioz's sister jumped like only a wharf-rat could for Ren's, she ditched for a hole where Jazhea had tripped and slumped into obscurity.

"Your name is Vaecusa, my fair dear, and I refuse to call you otherwise. I've always admired you, you know this. Please tell me you are not foolish enough to fall into the Dark Dweller's guise for delusions." The tallest of five squinted a steel gaze on the former comrade, the eldest leader hushed in a language of his broken tribe.

"How do I break this Curse in the land of the ice and tundra...with your three swords, sweet Emperor of the North Star?" Vaecusa smoothed her hostile tenacity, she scoffed at her once-captain's request. The unknown drunkard crawled to be free from underneath her deadening foot.

"Find your soul-sister, Avagon." The ancient knight yielded and turned his back. Saytai gathered at his mantle to collect a triad of cutlery and the last emigrants of Qui-Qua departed. Vaecusa left to strategize.

"I'm not leaving you behind, gal. Jazhea, come on! Let's go! We need to find big brother and tell him he's in danger from the hives!" The apt lass reeled her vexed ahoy and as she wallowed on a single boot, Solia mounted out of a broken hatch to buddy up. She escorted the flimsy wrist of the princess to Beesall's harness.

"Eat well, my babies, for when the Mantus feeds you will be yet hungry. With boats of your fangs, we gave them much pain. Your toxicity is so much more deadly with the taste of...human flesh of this wandering...pirate." Vaecusa took comfort in tormented yowls as she poured a vat of purple serpents over the feuding crewman's immobile body, dartha-eels tore through bones of the boisterous lowlife. The remains burned with infection, but did not melt to nothing.

"Me! Mother! For Z.M.Q.!" Joiquiva clenched a stomach now wrecked by a mysterious fluke. Insects squeezed from the stretching of her fluxing cheeks. Six graying limbs on each baby mutated before the injurous sunbeams from a warped eclipse, purged the remains of an internal ootheca. Kneeling to the searing damage, she was both riven and dismembered.

Insects of the night bellowed in gloom. The wash of the waves rose and collapsed. The cascading course recessed more and hurried to the tail of tide on low. The passage to an underwater seacove could be accessed.

"Zoolie! Wake up! You're out like you've tapped the whole tavern!" While he shouted for fellow eyes to awaken Ioz wobbled Zoolie, who was drooling down the chin.

"Huh? Sorry, Ioz, it's me head. I don't remember drinking any stout...Aye, we escaped from Z.M.Q. but not from shady 'Mant." The burbing gamesman drabbled from a coarse whirl.

"It was just a few moons after our Captain sent Mantus and his midshipman, Konk, out to retrieve what he imagined was the First Treasure of Rule when Kayrn's catastrophe happened...The trinket they brought back was fake. Ten more years passed for Ren to find the real deal with the Compass of Rule, but as it's said dropping it in the River of-" Zoolie was freely thwarted by a fidgety Ioz.

"I didn't mean for it, he was in the way and I needed a way to disable him. I was too quick to act on my impulses. I...damaged his lineal pride. Jitatan Quins are...presumably more port-steered-blood-on-bones, I only told one person about his accident...and it wasn't the lad or the eco-wench." Ioz withdrew an unloaded dragonbow as he prepared. He released the launcher after stretching it to the limit, Kauldron jolted upon the ricochet.

"Well I assure you, I won't be bothering any of your lady friends, I only care for Sugii, wherever she is...and I'm sorry Kayraadin didn't make it." Sitting on a log straight across from the buccaneer sworn from retaliation, Kauldron shifted uncomfortably.

"Spare it, she wasn't my friend. kayraa was Mantus's, and I loathed the way she ordered me around. I was merely a cabin-boy to her. I just choose to end his choke hold on her then, because I didn't think I would last to this day. In the wake of that brawl at sea you believe in no mornings, and I thought it taught him a lesson of how to treat...a cabin-lass. Unfortunately, his wenches have it worse now." Ioz fleetingly mourned the time ago, but uplifted his eyes.

"You've survived much, my friend." Kauldron supported the brave rebel with a lucky pat on the shoulder. "This is my concern for both of you and myself. I'll do all I can to assist you in your plight. I am interested though, I realize he is destructive but I have not seen anything I can relate to what provoked fear you have. My fears are for my family, but you speak as if he is capable of things not possible." Kauldron constructed his guess, he strode to the caboose of the single-file excursion.

"Fear? Revulsion, maybe. What Mantus does on the Maelstrom isn't short of impossible, anyway." Ioz shortly countered.

"He relished in filling her head with false promises and gyping her out of all her drabuls and gems to do his bidding. It just made me see red. You and your lady were lucky, Ioz. For the only one there who stood a chance against him, I failed to look after my sea-flora during those two years. If we broke her and her ward out of Commander Chungo's grubby clutches we would all go to Arakna island to see what was there, remember?" The shaky visage of optimism was caliginous as he trailed on, he solemnly sighed. Zoolie gathered his supply.

"They both aged ten years older than they are because of what we did. I didn't believe our lot in pirate life would get worse either, but the Leviathan Skull by Kuunda near-cracked because of us. Don't forget that." Reassuringly Ioz confirmed his reflection to the jittery pal.

Zoolie abstractly lamented. "Aye, I'll never forget that day. This time, I'm bartering with an actual leviathan before I try to reason with His Plumpness." He swung with his fist through the heavenly gales. "The road to Bloth's side of Octopon is below this low-tide. You joinin' us, Rookie?" He shifted the gear on his mantle, rubbernecking at the tag-along.

"Oh, I must bid you farewell. I will try to make it back at rendezvous if I am successful in slowing the Maelstrom-the plan. Stay away from Eel-blood, whatever this might mean...and I hope your port-ill fades, pirates." Kauldron nimbly skipped a leg behind him and after a snappy goodbye, eventually weaved away. Ioz and Zoolie waved him off, not spurring a commotion. Their fleeting ganders stilled for a moment as they shuffled away.

The pirate warriors hiked down the open coastland. Wading ankles sunk in the submersible floor that was normally blanketed by fizzing blue. The shelter was up ahead. The duo would only be given a deficient interval to vault down the furling avenue before the eddy would swell and then bury their footsteps. The great moon soon descended the zenith, Ioz and Zoolie yelled to each other to pick up the pace as the sea level swallowed their knees.

"Dive! Now! Whoooaaaa!" Two hollers splashed into the tubular channel, transported by a ravaging waterfall. Rapids crashed in a circular motion, side-winding and whipping until it at last walloped it's cargo into a polished aqueduct. The adventurers pushed themselves up and set attention on a rectangular pool with an even flow. Above was a funneled archway, apparently a subway-sewer lit by symmetrical rows of glowfish lanterns. The tubular structure of the walls were much like the Maelstrom's and would be if not for the clean, shapely architecture. Ioz wiped his face.

"The! Macho! Staroids! Will! Bring! The! Pain!" The robust greeting thundered from overhead.

"How about we bring the not yelling in our ears!? Who are you now?" Ioz regained his composure, meeting a hesitant glare at the beefy gang as he readied his sword. He did not lift his arm. Zoolie hurdled to a scuffle stance.

"We! Are! The! Macho! Staroids! We! Pound! On! Sea-punks! Because! We! Have! Nothing! Better! To! Do! Chungo! Sipping! Dry! Scum!" The unlikely guests awaited the whim of an entire army of musclebound starfish-humanoids baring grisly faces. In their suctioned arms clenched tight were columns of ammunition and ample starzookas.

"We! Bring! The! Muscle! To! The! Tussle!" The Staroid Commander pumped an oceanic fist with an excitable roar.

"We! Beat! Down! Everyone! Who! Is! Not! A! Macho! Staroid! Or! Can! Harpoon! The! Moon! Better! Than! We! Wish! We! Can! Harpoon! The! Moon!" The Macho-Staroid Captain stomped forward with a malevolent grunt and a pounding knuckle for the combat-ready explorers. "No! One! Joins! Or! Is! A! Macho! Staroid! Unless! He! Is! A! Man!" He let out a destructive battle-cry and a will to slay.

"We've got that covered." Ioz dropped his guard with a sly fake-out. He surrendered slowly but kept his defense. Zoolie caught his hint.

"We know someone you can beat up on. I'd say they're the best in the twenty-jitatan-seas at harpooning the moon too, plus they're lads with crooked teeth." Zoolie glinted with a chummy proposal.

"If! You! Join! Macho! Staroids! You! Must! Be! Macho! Like! Us!" Captain Staroid blasted his tigerish vocal-cords straight into the red-bearded denizen's brow.

"Watch them drop like flies when my arms get a-hold of 'em! 'Here, have a taste, ye girly lazy-masts!" Zoolie happily provided, he boosted Ioz out of the sewer-trench and heaved him into Captain Staroid with a ginormous soak. Inactivity was maintained while the flopped seastar squished upright.

"We! Like! Your! Masculine! Spirit! You! Can! Join! Us, Sissy! Sponge-Foam! Walnuts!" Captain Staroid allowed Ioz and Zoolie to join the Macho Staroids, having declared them both manly enough. Ioz sloshed through the alleyway, comforting his scalp.

"Tod! Stole! My! Giant-Squid! Powered! Star-Press! With! The! Spare! Fender-Canon-Grenade-Bicep-Chuks! I! Will! Rip! His! Toe-Nails! Off! In! Front! Of! His! Grandma! I'll! Be! Back!" One of the roaring subordinates pounded his chest and slammed through a tube.

"Did we make a mistake?" Ioz hushed a bright indication to Zoolie.

"Aye, and we'll ditch 'em once they meet our bargain." Zoolie reliably vowed as he breathed his sounds through a thick palm. The dynamic duo sprung over the hurdles inside Octopon's underground, slowly light from above would replace the dankness of the Staroid lair. Schlepping around a tortuous stretch of sand, they prepared to lie in ambush.

"The meddling wave that Konk is weaponizing the jitatan nightmare-poison is worse than Mantus going off the deep-end over insanity maps. Thank Kuunda for it being just another mirage of the sea. If Bloth thought for a dagron's wing-flap that I believed the Eel-blood Treatment doesn't heal like a Lethal Landshark-bite then it makes it so. He would leave me for dead in a whirlpool, but he'll take my word as blood. No talk of Maelstrom days, and never speak of the Eel-blood." Ioz stewed in silence after his divulgence creaked, stepping ahead on the ledge. He could not erase the memories of what he saw.

"Aye, ye don't have to worry about me mentioning it but ye know who is gonna twist the sword into me wound. With him, and as many times as we made the bet, ye'd think Maars wanted no more to do with me. What a surprise. You forgive me for draggin' you into my tavern-tussle, Ioz?" Zoolie singularly cast for a humane word, for once loosing his nerve of steel.

"Brother, I wouldn't have helped you otherwise. Don't get brine-boots, old-mate, tomorrow we're both either eating in a King's palace with the finest kleepa and playing the ritziest reef-roll, or we sleep in the black depths below. I won't let any other fate befall us. For now, I dread the fate of Ren." Ioz declared his oath with an unflappable devotion.

"You're a real good shipman, Ioz. By the Gods, we're getting to Ren before Mantus gets to Ren. That's a promise, friend. Mantus is going to pay for every dribble of enthusiasm he stole from my seaworthy Beauty's heart, even if I have to pry every poogat out of his mangy claws and give Bloth his vodelingin' regards." Zoolie praised and swore, watching his wavering image in the riming tide and the moment of reckoning that was drawing ever present.

"Zoolie?" Ioz carefully edged forward.

"Yeah?" Zoolie's pitch ascended after hearing the particular conjure.

"Even this hardened pirate's heart couldn't stand it, no one deserved such revolting oblivion. Yet, I saw it coming. Repugnant as it was, she was not on caliber with us seaworthy scum. Every sailor who is sharp but totally skillless without Mantus's help, those kind of lasses do not belong on jitatan pirate-ships. I'm sorry, Zoolie, honorable friend...she was a whipping-post for a dead man, and he will be if he tries to take any of us. His method of operation isn't solely known." Ioz cheerlessly exchanged, bolting eyes away.

"He only gets em' with the sword if he can't get em' with the bet. Tula and that newcomer are too shifty to fall in that net of his sea-shenanigans." Zoolie insightfully vocalized.

"I can't tell Ren and Tula about such a prolonged threat without abandoning this Quest. I never talked to your woman, she caused so much jitatan trouble in going out of her way to idolize him alone. Making misery for the rest of us, following me and pushing me to swab dagron-bilge or peel potatoes double-shift for all but the last of my pirate's youth. Chungo lungo. At the time it was unclear to me...until." Ioz paused as if awaiting, his breath stagnant.

"You did jitatan well for someone who launched the first arrow, chum." Zoolie drew near, inciting Ioz to finish. The barman curiously shifted his eyes to his companion.

"After I met Tula...she left for it, too. Exactly like kayraa's reason for weathering every sun and moonrise with a frigid and dangerous dartha-eel." Ioz tagged on, Zoolie only nodded. "This time she won't meet Teron, and kayraa won't meet Mizar. Tula and Ren will both meet kayraadin, and she'll be wielded at the mercy of the jitatan scummiest pirate-assassin on the foul waters." He spoke clearly and introspective. "Sea-lasses are brave like us, in one way we can't ever be. So was yours." He heavily droned on.

"Aye, not everyone who is brave wields a sword. Not everyone with strength falls by it." Zoolie scrupulously recited.

"Truthfully, Zoolie. It wasn't her manipulation that I didn't understand. No, I understood quite well what she was trying to do. More so, after I knew why Tula betrayed us, but almost dealt with Bloth instead of Mantus. Bloth knows who he's getting this time." Ioz squelched an unsettled abdomen, he choked on reservations.

"Kuunda have mercy on the sorry soul bamboozled to be exclusively their's, alive or doomed to die." Zoolie regretfully gulped. The shady air of storm had progressively rotted foul.

"Kayraa ultimately saved Mizar at the cost of her fragile life and yet, kayraa never bamboozled the paranoid scum-bag with as many skills as Tula is using now. Regardless of his restriction on lips, getting him to drink kleepa wasn't hard. Because greed and power are his only confidants, ale disappears down his throat like a shipwreck in the blacktide." Ioz unluckily expunged. "Now it's time. Go, when they hit land." He signaled a last call and braced for the scuffle, the one which would vanquish it all.

Zoolie yielded a minor glimpse out to the ebb. "Darkness descends on all the lands, poem didn't lie." The fiery rebel bellowed with fortitude as he ushered a minor hand out to the screeching black current, temporarily veering. He loosened his blade, as did his accomplice. The sun was jet.

"Never was the sore luck of a woman necessary to me, because I was no jitatan hero. I saw the opportunity to shoot his dwelling red, so I took it." Ioz weakly followed in conclusion.

"Except Taneuka? I'd presume." Zoolie shifted his pry to inspect the former shipmate next to him, a stray question started his suspicion.

"Except Taneuka." Ioz nodded with agreement. "That heirloom she's looking for belonged to a man I lost for life as well, I wonder where she's sailing to now." Ioz made a brief lapse to stir a recurring flashback, then he stayed and watched as the warship neared conclusion.

"Any last relatives we want to place in a bottle before we blow this thirty-six-year banquet?" Zoolie plucked a discarded ale-canteen, asking for a testament from his best-friend of fifteen years.

"I have only one message, this will be a very rich end. I'll steal gold and ale on my life." Lust of indulgences lit up the lips of the negative thrill-seeker, Ioz swung his burly shoulder for the final brawl.

"Anyone! Seen! With! A! Woman! Will! Fight! To! The! Death, In! The! Colosseum!" Captain Staroid disturbed the conversation with a bout of vehemence.

"My life is repeating itself." Ioz gradually caught up from Zoolie's right, his palm slid down his temple as he smacked his forehead.

Gliding over the heights of crystal valleys was a smooth burst of sleekness. Scales centralized and accelerated in point.

"Where is Mantus? Tell us now!" The eyes of the kidnapped woman jolted open at the charging sound of a strange occupant. Tula observed two dagrons, both white in luminosity and carrying known faces. The ecomancer witnessed a seemingly masterful pilot clapping away the rudder of the concoction with a powerful blade. Tula screamed to a final descent, quickly falling. Jargis was fleeing away in the wind with Slaggon. The dagron of the assaulter chased after, though it soon returned.

"Phorlock? Hey it's you!" Tula called out as she found herself face-to-face with the former aide of King Primus she had met on Avagon's fleet, before finding the 12th Treasure of Rule. She watched as he spun away from Jargis. "You're the Qui-Quin rider from the den of the wasps' domain!" She addressed to the other dagron, on which flew the previous accompaniment of Jazhea. She felt a quartet of fingers grasp her wrist and pull her up, then a thin weapon cutting her free.

"The proper term is Quin, Tula, and you may call me Saytai." Saytai corrected Tula with grace as she lifted the younger female on the back of the great beast. The lizards receded downward, landing on the solid ground that was farther away from the beacon of Octopon. "I don't see him, yahil." The rescuer informed the far rider as she dismounted from her own steed, scanning around.

"If Bloth is here, then he is too, flora." Phorlock sternly assessed, probing the ground. He circled around on foot. Tula noticed his ensemble of a sliver beard and brow as the only thing that stood out of the atmosphere.

"Yahil, should I go back to the fleet? I don't wish to be in the way. He won't listen. Not to me." Saytai seemed to beg of the elder.

"Gantha-wash, Saytai. You are a skilled pilot, indeed. Mizar owes his life to you, and the protection of everything sacred about the Treasures. He would have drown coming out of that crushing mouth, not entailing what would have happened to his map if it had gone under. Not to mention, my own freedom from Bloth's brig...Mizar may have still been in that prison cell before you returned on the dawn of Kayraadin's misfortune, but he was on King Primus's One page and felt pride for all who were rescu-" Phorlock earnestly resolved as he jut an oblong head.

"Excuse me." Tula cut in. "Do either of you notice anything...amiss here?" She respectfully questioned, deciding not to get in their way but being outstandingly unopportune by the essence of darkness that was veiling her sensitivity. Both pivoted to gander at her with oval eyesight.

"Of course, as an ecomancer, you feel it manifold." Phorlock distributed an ambiguous but fluent reply. He then turned to the more docile emigrant.

"We can't be of help. Sorry, Tula!" Saytai hospitably yodeled back, both aviators flit away and departed into the lifeless dome of storm.

Tula peeked about the dreary environment. In the backdrop of the sky, she witnessed a shape drawing near. She could not make out a resemblance, but an air of familiarity reached her from some recess of her breaching thoughts. Underneath, another figure floated. One she could swear by the two moons of Mer she knew.

Ioz's eyes focused on the hull of Bloth's approaching ship, regardless of whether it was what Avagon wished or not. He waited with Zoolie crucially at his side, swords constrained and ready for the lurid frigate to port. He was seen from a standpoint by the creaking ship in the water.

"Well, well. Looks like our hosts are eagerly awaiting our arrival." Bloth's amused parlay dallied from the wheel of the Wave as he lowered a spyglass and peered toward the proximate shore. The evil monkeybird of yellow stood upon his shoulder and a shifty piglet stilled by his side. He did not see the fleet in the distance.

"This is pleasant. Now I can at long last have my revenge on that featherbrain that ruined my name and my life!" Yellow-wing harshly yaked. "Then I will be the greatest monkeybird to ever live, at the side of the King of Mer!" Yellow-Wing snickered with a sneaky grin as the devious Pirate Lord stroked his feathers and shared in a moment of cunning wickedness.

Bloth cast upward the Sword of Primus in his arm, admiring it. "Such a mighty Sword, one fit for a King! When I learn how to use it, the whole of Mer will be in my possession!" Bloth trilled as he beamed at the Sword, dreaming of treacherous victory. He curved an eye to his subordinate, who was beside him at the wheel. "You've done well, Konk. Surprised me." Bloth genuinely praised, glinting a joyful wink at his inferior officer.

"Of course, Sir!" Konk hiccuped with a chuckle, his sly eyes smiling.

"You may go and send out the best of our men to destroy that miserable Ioz and his borca-brained friend." The pirate Captain calmly ordered.

"Excellent, Master!" Konk zestfully burbled, happier than a pup in a candy-clam store.

"The man is a trustworthy source for hearsay. Should he squeal, make sure to listen. We'll find Tula and anyone valuable to us after we dispose of Ioz and his...instigator. Where is that eel-slivered Mantus? He'll want to partake in this. I fear he's spending too much time with the blond scrawny-necked-prisoner." Bloth suspiciously pondered why his commander was Absent-Without-Official-Leave while running his clammy fingers across the telescope.

"Hahhah!" Konk obnoxiously blathered. "Me think he's shirking on duty, off betting somewhere. And blowing someone else's gold!" The piglet fervently voiced his opinion with a shout.

"He had better not be." Bloth grumbled warningly. The cruiser en route to the lighthouse passed by brush. To the Pirate Lord's correlation, he noticed something out of the corner of his saffron eye. The gaunt body emerged from out of vegetation and sediment, clutching hands to knees in attempt to draw in air. The form distraughtly flailed arms as a signal to the passing frigate. "Noy jitat!" Bloth cursed and towed the ship to shore earlier than he would have liked. He and his men geared up to disembark as the frame raced to the bank.

"Lord Bloth, Sir! The boy! Something's wrong!" Through strained breathing Mantus choked out.

"What?!" Bloth did a doubletake and raised a bare eyebrow, the feeling of disturbed anger had started to flood in.

"The chamber is filling with light!" The commander managed to squeeze out, his report came a little too late. Two heroes had pursued them and an ambushing sword struck at Mantus, who was unprepared and clouted over. It then zinged at Bloth, who immediately centered to block. The second weapon lashed at Konk and the now regained Mantus, who drew his own blade. Yellow-wing squawked above, contesting to drive away the interrupters.

"Ioz, you never knew when you've been beaten!" The punitive sputter of the Pirate King bludgeoned as he met with the slashing raider of swart. He pointed forward in a signal for his myriad to spoil.

"That's because this time, you're the one who will taste the sword! For Ren you will pay, Bloth! Chungo lungo!" Ioz valorously outcried in battle, raring and roaring for the infamous opponent. With dexterous reflexes, he skipped around a bramble of musclebound rubes aiming for his neck. With the speed of his dashing boots he heroically slammed the shaving metal against Bloth, flecks of embers shedding from the crossfire.

"By the Shadow Moon blast you and your...nerve!" Bloth spat with provoked rage, to Ioz's haughty laugh. With an irascible growl he scooped the hilt to the sky and wrought to clap it down over the fearless rogue, who tumbled away.

Ioz was holding his own against the Pirate Lord, Bloth had not once managed to rap the blade out of his hand. His eyes focused to the grand Heirloom-Sword that was not in use and strapped to the back of the hated boss. He would have to get to it somehow, but the foe was attacking from the front and not the back. His hands were full. He wrangled to force his most indomitable enemy back with his rugged vigor, and to develop a plan to reclaim the Sword at the same time. He listened to a sound from the side, over the chiming of clashes.

"Hahah, Ioz! Me still have Treasure!" The taunt of a chubby and one-legged goon flew from the deck of the docked vehicle, Konk flaunted a flat diamond above his bloated head.

"No!" Ioz exclaimed in the fit of the moment, suddenly the dynamic changed. He heard a squawk from behind him and swayed a glance for only a breather. Niddler had arrived, Tula could be seen far in rear. He smirked. The ultimate countdown was about to commence.

"So he says to me...I didn't know-" One spare buccaneer loitered about the deck as he rambled on a pleasant retelling.

"Haha, Mantus tell funny story!" Konk gladdened in a obtrusive snort.

"Captain! Staroid! Smash!" Captain Staroid powered out of the bracken, hefting the gossiping pirates overtop his muscular starfish-neck. He dropped them onto the floor in a pounding smack-down after hearing their sissified yelps.

"Bring! Your! Anchor! Shirt! Because! The! Staroidater! Will! Torpedo! Your! Wee! Buoy-Flanks! With! The! Mighty! Kelp-Fire! Magnum-Lasers! On! My! Star-Pits-Carpet! Of! Sea-Tiger-Leviathan-Fur! Oh! Yeah!" In a outburst coming only from a magnificent powerhouse, Commander Staroid splatted four puny cronies with the dripping fuel from his Starzooka. He freely shoved his hips, rejoicing in a dance of manhood.

"These kreld-faces must be it!" The Valjen flock scuttled in from out of the wild ferns, braying while causing mayhem with the Macho Staroids. Big Shellga of the South Pole discarded Captain Staroid into the midnight death with a rolling flip of her wrist, she ordered her robust lads at the body-building bottom-feeders. The echinoderms dominoed and rubbed into each other. Many of the encroaching rustlers tripped.

"Konk! You were supposed to keep it hidden, you barnacle-swine!" The contemptuous adversary furiously hissed. Ioz lashed an indurate blow. Why was Bloth not seeking to escape? Niddler had dive-bombed Konk in attempt to free the jewel. Bloth torpedoed up the gangplank with intent to crush the fluffy ally, burring metal into wood as Niddler touched the wind. Ioz chased the scene. Niddler swept for the mainstay and at last freed a jib, which crashed down on the dry boards underneath. "Take care of them!" He clamored at the remaining minions. Niddler wielded a broken baton, this time hurtling straight for the nefarious Captain.

"This one is mine!" Yellow-Wing blared as he drove at the radiant monkeybird, attempting to pin with claws. Niddler stroked the bastion but Yellow-Wing not only chomped it from grip, but began to scrape at his injured hunt. The rod whirled off the floating platform and into the fatal mass of blobbing black. He wrenched a hold of Niddler's wings and started ripping out feathers from the back. Niddler squirmed to get him off.

Niddler agonizingly squawked. "You'll never be any greater than any of us! Stop going against your own people!" The sanguine monkeybird screeched.

"You!" Yellow-Wing screamed in an openly furious rave. "You destroyed my name with your little rebellion, Niddler the bilge-beaked scum-bird!" The sunny monkeybird killed his impassioned ramble almost immediately. The abstruse shape was pouring into vision out of the miasma, the outline of what surfaced to be vast wings of an insect and two contrasting humans. Dual laughs bore over writhing ears and a net launched at the tangling competitors.

"It's too bad you looked up to such a rotten man, Ioz! Your father never repaid his debts! You should be glad I ordered my crew to permanently dispatch him! Although, it didn't do much for you now, did it?" Bloth belched spitefully at the gutsy challenger he contented to toy with. Ioz concentrated with an ireful scowl, his steel met Bloth's several times and neither one could break through to the other.

"Full! Speed! Ahead! On! My! Manly! Musk! Let's! Roll!" Portside on the Wave, the Macho Staroids raged against Bloth's men and the Valjen cutthroats.

"Hand it over, Bloth!" The attention of the two combatants was forced away at the sound of a feminine command ringing from the bow. Avagon strolled forward, she emerged from the very dust cloud of havoc before she was finished. Cleaved in her hand was the collar of a passed-out pirate, whom she then dropped. With another quickhanded strike, she confiscated the gem that Konk had only loosely guarded from his upright posture.

"Avagon!" Ioz lauded with expansive eyes. The snowy woman flung herself forward in a slide, slipping her own weapon out of the sheath and pushing it against the same blade he strove to face off.

"Ioz! He can't use the last of the Treasures without Ren. He's nearby, it's the only reason Bloth is here! Otherwise he-" Avagon began to inform the mariner next to her as she reached out to hand him the shard. In one more instant, she was lobbed off the ship before she could finish. The 12th Treasure fell back into the piglet's mitts. Bloth smiled. Ioz grimaced, stewing with scorn.

"I'm done playing this game, hand it over or you will die! I swear by Raymit's blood I'll make you pay for this! This fight is over before it begins, you're not my cap-" Ioz flew into a turbulent flurry of threats until he was overpowered by a sudden and intense heat. Bloth was cemented with an aghast gape at the open sky and a drop of sweat ticked from Ioz's temple. He swirled around to witness vermilion beads of lava levitating over the Wave.

"Noy jitat! Ioz, you're the best man on board! It's Mantus's forces! Quickly, take the helm and get us out of here!" Bloth trounced about in a panic, leaping and lumbering about to set up things for hightailing.

"What, Bloth? What trick is this now? I don't trust him, or you!" Ioz rigidly protested, greatly floored at even the suggestion. He watched above as the blazing globs of inferno bounced in the heights on wings of jell. His temperature began to assume the level of being too close to a campfire. One bombed and slipped into sloe sludge, steam from the molten vermin vivified and percolated into the stony air. He coughed.

"You know what a half-masted blackguard Mantus is, now take the helm, you gada-docked man!" Bloth stood at the opposite polarity of Ioz, before the mast as he issued the stern order with shuddersome disarray. The needle of a spar inflamed, but fizzled out. Sparks of flames dripped onto the wet floor and steamed as the giant scrambled with his might to retract the gangplank.

"By Raymit, I swore I'd never follow you as my captain again." The brawny Tayhojian rightly preserved. He peeked an apprehensive scout at the Magmatates mounted by the bonemail-and-stone-armored Securitat-cavalry. "Scot-pango on a sea-snake." He straightly simpered, he abandoned his sword and took the wheel.

"Kuunda save us from the second-in-command!" Bloth wailed from throwing the remnant of his crew on board to act. The flag overhead splashed with flares as it partway melted to debris.

The other-side of the battlefield filled with clashes of metal. Two fighters on shore crossed arms.

"Ioz!" The helpful cry attempted to reach the brink of the hull in time before it cast off. The abominable bane of misery leapt in his way once again to restart the contention.

"You never succeeded, but I credit you for forcing my hand." The ghastly rasp of a thief reviled.

"What's done is done, kreld-eater, but your last moments won't be far out to sea, I can assure you of that. After you're done running that goija soap on your fishy scalp do think you'll enjoy them with a loofah, fraudulent darva-blood?" The gallant innkeeper firmly apprised.

"Bloth would have thrown her to the Constrictus, regardless of my interference." The sly slayer fleered.

"Those are fighting words, mate. Don't you know unnecessary ruthlessness will bring you daybreak-brunch from Kuunda's backwash, sea-scum?" The valiant battler of the duo went on with a hint of edge. Dual slicers clacked.

The duelist laughed. "You want to avenge her death. It is unlucky I can't remember all of that morning, it was a priceless Moonsail Festival. A hard day's work deserves a hard night's reward. Not that you understand what hard work is, tubby drunkard." The deceitful man jeered.

"Nice wasting joke, scammer. You glug as much as me, ye just ride dagrons and swordfight all day! That's not how it works. You don't swig all the ale for yourself, you share it." The hefty wrangler scolded.

"The dead tell no tales, Zoolie, too bad for you!" The cheapskate violently chuckled as he slashed a slick shard of razing metal against the brunt of the opponent. Without much concern, he lunged forward and beat at his target until he managed to catapult the enemy from his barrier.

"Duping desperate stowaways for your jitatan amusement is your tale, Mantus, as reneging on your promise to honor Kayrn's deal for freedom when I won the bet in her place. Her poor win-streak didn't give you any right, unless you let her buy the sea from Bloth. Her 'Paps would have done, though." Zoolie reminisced of long ago, he witnessed Ioz slipping away and his temperament felt like breaking. He charged for the slippery quarry.

"It's your duping-skin to pay for, smool-brain. I bet one gold on your reveal of Ioz's treachery to the crew and you didn't give me my winnings I won on your forged prank, but remember no plunder is needed for traitors who pleasantly fork over their own wages. She groveled for a raise and I did her a favor, why didn't you ask her instead of wagering on aimless revenge? Yours was the wench who kept herself as loot, like you." Mantus scoffed with recollection.

"The only traitor is you. You're about as two-faced as they come, Mantus, and Bloth should have eel-hauled you years ago! Our bet was an even rematch. You never took a liking to me from day one, but you're a waste of arms to drag an honest soul into it! So tell me why you're always looking over those skinny shoulders like a mate is going to get you with a bolt in the back, any briny-salt can see you pedal in your skull daily over Blue-lips catching you in your turncoat shams." Zoolie quietly burned, shaking and withholding emotion.

"Amateur, your form is terrible!" The formidable foe viciously reveled and with the push of an edge, he flung the barkeep. "You want to die?! We're not surrounded by tables and chairs, shirker! Or the open sea! Now eat dark water!" He ferociously growled, nimbly slicing into the steel and dashing a median length in circuit.

"What won't you do to advance your horde-of-shine, kreld-bucket?" Zoolie flipped up from his landing spot on a knee and brashly slammed at the immoral cohort.

"How disgracing! Your feeble guts are still not used to forms of jewelry-robbery even years before my own place on the Maelstrom, becoming so attached to something never meant to last. That is a problem! Not mine. Your fair-wench's numbered days weren't horrible, not when she was comfortable with me. My upscale treatment was much better than that of the other scurvy-brine. Unless you would have cared for her to play the Sport of Janda-town, because she almost did! Pay up, or be diced up." Mantus heartlessly berated as he hooted, throughly pleased.

"You scot-pangoin' verminous rat, show me a barmaid you didn't need to run and I'll give you that gold piece." Zoolie bent his own cutter back and tried to distract Mantus, who was prowling for him like a sea-shark on a prey.

"Seriously barmaids. They don't live long enough for me. Someone keeps all of us shipshape and entertained during slow winds. You know how many riches suffering brings? Too many to not take advantage. Does the lonely sea-cow need a wench?!" Mantus's ignominy belittled, shoulders shrugging indifferently before then pounding away.

"Not when I have one right across from me, now play the game right or trade in your sword for Bloth's potato-squadron with the rest of em'." Zoolie hoped for the chance he could do something about the situation. His chest was too warm and his insanely remorseless component did not seem a petty afflicted. "Mantus!" He blurted rashly, a whisper of a zip dove toward a sparkle.

"Poor gold-digging bride. So much pain reeks from your pathetic flesh, and still less than she endured. Yet you unleashed every one of her own worst nightmares, through your own ignorance!" The strategist coolly construed himself, ending with a cacophonous laugh.

"I! Will! Crush! Your! Jaw! And! Grind! Your! Teeth! Into! Rock! Salt! Then! I! Will! Make! You! Ride! Them! To! The! Bone! And! Swallow! What! Is! Left! Of! Your! Princessy! Hair! Chungan! Daisy-Mast!" What remained of the Macho Staroids were riding upon the backs of Bloth's pirates like sea-cowboys and could be noticed from Zoolie's backdrop. Mantus altered temporal attention from swordplay to the odd sea-circus, forming a frown.

"For Mizzen-Conquest!" Hailing from the morbid sky was a sacrificial Securitat, the torrent of volcanic refuse flushed into the ground on impact. Time did not calm and the sparring challengers rocketed on cardinal feet to escape the cracking flow of scorching liquid. The searing liquid blew the Macho Staroids sky-high and charred each one of them to a crisp.

"By the denbar-rats of grog-cove. You're really asking for a catastrophe, and making me wanna jam you inside of one legs-out." Zoolie panted with a frenzied censure at his designated malefactor. He observed Ioz driving the Wave into the opening curtains of apocalyptic glop.

"Ioz, keep us on course! We're almost away from them!" Bloth dictated from scoping the brigade of floating coals in the distance that was too near. Charring dregs discharged in a volley of crimson napalm on the shores and hungry droves of dark water. The Captain drenched a crate of slowing materials into the beyond and assumed his surveying post. The combustion from faroff blasted air-streams of smoke.

"You never told me he owned those pyre-drowning Magmatates. Anything else you want to tell me about, Captain Bloth?!" Ioz stuttered as he piqued the question that he was reluctant to know answer. His adrenaline was reclining in his veins. Slowly, the pump dwindled. The spool of the helm was already glistening with sweat and his hands would easily slip, this variation of seasickness was not anything experienced in eons.

"Only that he's already obtained Thumbbites from the grassbeds of Octopon's Star Meadows!" Within a fit of temporary madness Bloth hysterically revealed.

"What?! Impossible! The Nightmare Eel-blood is only found in the Ruins of Taikal!" Ioz rattled under a tremor of sickened repugnance. "What do we do, Bloth?" He desperately interrogated from his crippled base. "Captain?!" Ioz drastically begged for some last resort or even a response, he shivered as he oscillated his tortured gawk between Bloth and the spacious forefront.

"We go back around, and get him." Bloth's smirk played across his lips as he slugged the altruistic Ioz from the wheel. The sting of perfect betrayal consumed as Ioz rushed to reach his blade and plead Zoolie's name from the ledge.

The combat of the sailors on the waterfront verged on chaotic, the sweltering waves of heat grew to an enormous league.

"She enjoyed her last request. Like she enjoyed her daily tasks with me, always, and such a devout sailor she was." Mantus shiftily desecrated the gaining brawler at his mark.

"That's not true, mate, you delighted in making her personally kiss your sun-bleached sail. Jitatan sunrise to moonrise." The barkeeper crossly retorted. He gaped at the frightening second-in-command, and in reverse at the commander's army.

"This time, you'll lose as much as she did when she played my game." Mantus sneered with an edging dishevelment. The breeze was hastening to become nonexistent, and the air evaporating. Drips of residue were forming at his crown.

"You're gonna lose a lot more than your drabuls if you don't tell your friends from the bilge-hold to cut the kleepa! You know, why don't we just call this even and save both our hides before we're boiled alive." Zoolie encouraged the slate-maned duelist to recess from arms.

"You're a bait-hearted wimp!" Mantus instead retaliated, intent on terrorizing retribution. He forced his tough impulses, though he was roasting from his own smothering control.

"Zoolie, I've got this one. Your Wraith-shuttling dock-rat, Ioz, can bite black-kreld but I respect you, and this Guuda-blooded sea-slug will pay for what he did. A little Dartha-Nightmare-Eel Venom should shut his scummy yap!" The call from a closeby darkhorse faintly jangled. Zoolie grinned as a limb of plate-metal lashed back the string of a dragonbow, pointed at the vital chamber of the swordsman. The clever tavernowner moved in for the diversion. The zoom of a bolt dinged a stone.

The unlikely archer's shot missed. Mantus skid away too soon at the rumble of a fat piglet being ejected by the craft inclining to shore. "Whoooooaaa!" Konk moaned as he splatted on the rocks. "Ow!" He yowled after contacting the brimstone. Zoolie jostled away, tripping to follow the Treasure-toting gantha-hog.

"Zoolie! We're falling to Fezwa! I'm a jitatan-fool and I doomed them both, why does everything I say have to come true?!" Ioz howled shatteringly from the impending vessel, behind him could be seen a murderous Bloth and the flash of sliver after Ioz rolled away. The barman's face iced. Mantus slyly smiled and pounced.

"It's you, Konk! Oh what a day this is to have my revenge! It's too bad I can't throw You to a Biperian landshark, sail-raiser! Ahahahahaa!" The phony-armed mercenary crowded around the runt on the turf, crowing and clicking rabidly as he ditched the arrow-launcher. "Do you know how much you made me suffer from your little accident?" He sizzled with an inhuman umbrage as he blocked the pegleg's escape route. "I'll give you a hint!" He nastily clacked his arm, temper singeing.

"Landshark take Joat arm because Bloth pay me and Mantus 15000 poogats even, if we take Treasure of Rule from you. Me lose leg too, only one because of bad rumor about you stealing gem in Kalinda." Konk groaned when he nervously tapped backward, the 12th Treasure was in his palm as the Wave was docked on the aqua coast. He couldn't very well use it as a projectile.

"That's righttt! Except it wasn't a Treasure of Rule and I lost my swordsmanship and reputation for No! Reason! At all! Now beg for your life, smool-brained darva-worm!" The predator cackled in a periled rave of a maniac.

"Actually..." Konk switched his peeking yellows and formulated a new idea. "Konk know other way out!" He deftly asserted as he detached and boomeranged his false appendage at a part of the attacker that wasn't made of steel. He caught his baton and hobbled aboard a wafting raft, wading back to the frigate on his rump. The assaulter was doubled over and screaming into the ground.

"You stubby darva-rascal, I can't believe you did that! You don't do that!" The mutant-bandit shrieked when he slammed his lone and fleshy fist onto the solid rocks, but quickly bayed. On his alloy knees he cursed the all-too-cowardly midget that got away.

"Konk is no man." On the opposite fringe, Mantus boastfully scorned. He targeted and incised at Zoolie's weak spot on the torso, using up more energy as he dove for the kill.

"Aye, and you're a sissy too!" Zoolie choked out with a constrained jeer. He blocked with all the ability underneath his throe. The throbbing pressure from the clouds of ashes caused waves in the bleeding atmosphere. The hotness alone could ingest the cutthroats submerged in their own perspiration, and the squadron was aligning in a formation to dive. Mantus would soon retreat.

"I'm not the man who will be incinerated!" Mantus diabolically ridiculed the loser as he backtracked in motion, a generous sneer balanced on his angular jawbone.

"We have Ioz, it's time for him to die because he is a friend of Prince Ren!" Reotozz merrily sung from the overhead the scuffle.

"By Kuunda's deed, how many enemies do ye got, Ioz?" Zoolie coughed with unfortunate luck. Under the current scorch, he could barely move and Mantus was creeping ever farther in regression.

"More than you can shake a darva-worm at!" Ioz hastily granted answer, running about on the platform.

"'Ay Ioz, I'm reminded again why I don't fight Mantus on a midnight-moonrise. Not that he and his folks see such a thing until the end of the year." Zoolie tragically huffed, beaten sore on his hands and knees as Mantus signed skyward with a shout for action.

"Go, Delta! Tell our mother I said Hi, enjoy the secret alias I helped you construct!" Reotozz signaled for another Securitat on a Magmatate to fly off. "Feel the wrath of Reotozz, and his explosion! Reotozz succeeds in riding the bomb down!" He then directed the units as he was ordered but he did not do as he was told and he drove his Magmatate for Mantus on the sandbar, who hurdled away with flaying motion in a heartrending whimper. Hardly was the commander able to save his own person from lapsing into a crackling lake of molten flare that puffed into the above. Delta escaped on her beast as the remainder of the Securitat barraged and erupted into a meltdown, erecting a momentary firewall between the lighthouse and the mooring plateau. Bonemail helmets rained down while Mantus and Zoolie were the last two on the heated crag.

"I don't know why ye did that, Reotozz, but you just earned yourself recognition!" The newly spared Zoolie commended the fallen soldier as he once again charged for the weakened fiend, fighting with strength in one arm. Mantus sprinted toward the hull with a fury.

"That beggarly wench has an excellent gallop when skewered with a soakingscoo-scale. I'd say a betting man does...fine." Mantus had slowly backed up from the present locking of metal and fell silent, he chillingly phrased words.

"What by Kuunda's name did you just say, you foul-lipped darva-maggot?!" Zoolie would have been floored, his balance was off as he barely lipped a reply. Mantus grinned and proceeded to swipe the rival to the rough sediment underfoot.

The churlish swordsman crowed. "Between swabbing or sparring, it's a tough call under my orders to choose her motivation to romp deck. Every Maelstrom man loves a fin-cut of juicy yuugla, catching them is too easy when they are enamored with a tormented squealer's scent. I think I should tell you how high the steaks were after the 67th full-lap, since you didn't join in the Treatment with us, second-mate!" The commander howled madly.

"Is that so, naja-dog? That's a grubby excuse." Zoolie lifted himself back up, deflecting the tinge he felt.

"Try 500 for each after the ten mark. It's unusual for me to leave a trace, but your hardworking betrayer deserved something undignified...like a swordhandle. Subordinates worthy of stature only receive something special for their precious jewelry. There's nothing wrong with having a lackey bonus, Zoolie." Mantus hissed hatefully and chuckled with a dig. Remounting the board to the ship, he aimed to leave the fire-hair to personal struggles.

"While you were dragging on blood skies, Ioz and myself were organizing to end yours. You know who you owe your life to last time. How you think you'll go down, evil dastard? Hoisting Bloth's sails until your end, scamp, basking in swag or impervious wealth, you jitatan snake?!" Zoolie hounded the crude foe, following after with a plodding wrath. He spaced himself between the bulwark of the vessel and the mast that Mantus was fortifying, beginning to concoct a plan.

"No. I'll be swimming in it!" Mantus declared with a frozen meanness and an infinite arrogance. "Too bad for you I have to slash and dash!" He outcried as he railed the curved weapon over his head and seized the opportunity to cut, this time intent on eliminating.

"Swimming, eh? I'll give you a hint! Now what's golden like the night sky and black all over?" The bright-haired buccaneer taunted. He rolled out of the way, past another ruffian and set eyes on a bung that looked like it could be pitched. Focusing on his ascent from the floor, he turned his mind from a few of the ways he could make this happen. "Take a bath, Mantus! I can smell your Guuda keel from here!" Zoolie cried out a distraction with a glimmer in his eye as he elevated the ponderous drum, arranging to hurl it.

Mantus's expression wrenched with the realization of leagues of blackened waves to his rear. Then, the tavernowner was bowled over. He shifted a startled peek to the source of an ally. "Proficient timing, Jargis." The bladesman graciously bid his defender a mindful note. He snapped his offended attention back on the recovering man.

"Anything for you, old chum!" Jargis smiled greedily and laughed from a short distance apart. He tossed a long rod to his side.

"Ioz, we weren't having a wild night in Janda-town back there with that witch-brew captain of Ren's old-fellow were we? My head feels like it." Zoolie temporarily smeared his fuzzy mane, his flushed cheeks slumped. Ioz's dragging bearing decided otherwise.

"Say that to me again, filth! This time with my full attention!" The second-in-command verged on furious as he whipped an enraged boot at the partway-collapsed figure on the ground and resumed a combat stance. "Just how did you expect to stop me by your own hands? You couldn't even spring your own woman from my cage because you didn't have Mizar's brigkey." He simmered with another detestable bite. "You'll never be as tough and macho as I am, slug-larva! She needed me the most! Die, now!" He savagely bellowed, flying in a leap at the massive warrior who stalled his flurry.

Zoolie toppled aside and instead of reciprocating, pulled out a carton of jugs and began drinking one. "I'll bring the openbar to you." With a glint and a friendly chuckle, he loosed the ale jar from his hand and conked Mantus on the head. He watched the evil crook thump to the floor and took out more knaves in such pattern.

"You can't bring an openbar to a water-fight! Yohohohohooo!" Ioz suddenly jumped away from Bloth's killing slicer to hilariously amplify out of cupped hands, then started clapping.

"You saying I have to follow the rules, Ioz? 'Cause I'm not! How 'bout round two!" Zoolie cheered exhilaratingly and punted down more thieves, he whirled around a hookline onto a spar and swung himself propulsive to boot down a row of another twelve. Mantus revived and sat up to rub his head. "There you are, friend! You're missing all the fun!" He happily caromed to squeeze the squirming and bleating Mantus in a tight hug before proceeding to dump him jet-mop-first into a barrel of fish. "Now you can smell like dinner, old swabbie! Just like old times!" He giddily laughed, gleaming at the grunts and groans as the legs flailed in the air. The commander and the canister overturned with a spill of smelly goija. Mantus uplifted his head in a stupor, but his stun rapidly morphed into a furious scowl.

"Aaarrrrghhhaaaaa! You'll pay for that!" The manipulative bettor roared on cue with intimidatingly open arms and brandished sword.

"Oh, you're not so tough. I'll bet you don't even have a dirty or wicked scheme should you get those Treasures, you losing scoundrel." Zoolie lazily wisecracked.

"That's where you're wrong! I have big plans. Once I get those Treasures I'll make sure every other enemy of mine does not exist anymore, then by Kuunda I'll be the only man! Once I buy enough kutlack to slaughter enough leviathans for their bones to rebuild the Maelstrom with it's new name, the Mizzen-Conquest, gold will be very hard to steal because every piece of jewelry and coin will be melted down into plating to coat my hull as a symbol of my endless wealth and power! Then I'll recruit my crew of pirate-wench-slaves from all nations of Mer so I can sail forever with only the rarest shapes on my board! I want it all, I don't care how, all for me!" In a twinkle of bitter upset, Mantus told all.

"Sounds like a party to me, mate. Except, what about when your thousand ship-wives start playing rounds by themselves after the result of all those decadent Captain's feasts on your bow, and you know...the lack of competition." Zoolie paused to rile, agreeably puzzled.

"I'll have plenty assignments to keep me ship-shape as Captain, smool-brain, like letting my deck-hands admire the grand prize of a golden-blooded Quin! Don't you see, idiot?! I am what Mer needs! You wish your whiskers were as long as mine, but when I become King you'll be-!" Mantus assaulted on limbs like sticks, flaying short of just nicking the rusty beard.

Zoolie jumped back and bashed a full jug of ale at the rail-of-a-man, who was instantly pelted down. "Dead. Seriously? Guess you didn't learn anything at all, golden Guuda-blood. Better hope Captain kreld-eater didn't hear you. By the way, Beard-Looper, you need to chill like a newly draftin' dingamord." Zoolie stood up and continued the long fight with a smirk. Mantus emerged from the plank tier, flushed with rage at the sight of Bloth and Ioz interlocked and only an insignificant distance away.

The remaining scratch in the fabric of the canvas was waxed, erac.

"Jargis! You said I would be your second-in-command!" From across the sector, Yellow-Wing dejectedly whined of ill-treatment. He yelped as an enemy beak clamped down on his hand, Niddler glared at him with steaming ire.

Jargis shrewdly laughed. "Yes, and as my second-in-command, you'll help me restart my empire on Pandaawa!" The monkeybird-trader announced his ambition to the two monkeybirds trapped underneath a cumbersome net. "Slaggon, how has that new strain been coming? If it can rid the monkeybirds of any rebelling qualities, we'll both be set for the rest of our days!" The seated monkeybird-tycoon chuckled with exuberance.

"A lot better now that I have these two to work on, and I never have to wash the musking grease off of a single dish again." Slaggon grinned from leaning over and speaking with purport to the captives at his feet. "It won't be the same as creating another Queen. It will involve splicing traits from another, more subservient creature. Perhaps the native Redaa species of goija would be a nice choice. Either way, I'll need sufficient funds to create a hybrid Queen. I expect my live on Miragon to be substantial if I offer my, assistance." He stingily awaited a reply.

"What kind of half-brother would I be?" Jargis laughed, amused at the foolish concept.

"Wait...you mean! No! Oh by the two moons, why did I have to have an evil grandfather?" Niddler distraughtly whimpered. The uproar of humor from the two relatives soon started.

"You monkeybirds were an experiment. After being orphaned on Miragon with only it's many species to look up to, I needed to make some form of live. Not that your father-species even exists anymore. Older brother flourished after making some good pirate friends on his many journeys." Slaggon duly illustrated.

"My success became your success after our exploration of Miragon and the middle-land of Pandaawa. Even your mother would be rolling in her grave had she heard what you achieved, Slaggon." Jargis completed with a keen acclaim.

"Leave us monkeybirds alone! We'll never be your slaves! Not even if you created us!" Niddler squawked and flailed to free himself. He wriggled a head loose and mustered the strength to nip Jargis on the toe, pelting his wings.

Jargis yowled nastily. "You'll pay for that, insolent monkeybird! You'll soon learn who is in charge here!" The monkeybird-slaver sneered, removing from a pocket a distinctive shell. He snickered as Niddler's eyes shocked open. "That's right, slave." He clamored with a hearty and victorious laugh as he cracked the clam open. Niddler crashed and wailed. Yellow-Wing was unaffected, simply leering.

"You-you've built up an immunity!" Niddler squealed through the grinding sounds. "Help us get out!" He screeched again at the unresponsive golden-plume. "You're-willing to endure the worse torture-for gain, and so you could get back at us!" He obtrusively screamed and kicked a taloned foot at Yellow-Wing as he twisted.

"Come here, you useless beast!" Mantus's confounded summon reached Yellow-Wing on the bow, the unaffected breed glinted and began to scatter his way out of the snare.

"You hand-feeder!" Niddler's tormented claw had latched to Yellow-Wing as his volatile maw buzzed.

Yellow-Wing indifferently removed the interruption, but delayed his rumble out of the trap. "Mantus and I will be best-mates on the throne of Mer! We'll have all the exotic hens in the land to ourselves! I'll have all the finest eggs! The yellowest eggs! Mine for the tak-" The high-strung monkeybird snickered in the midst of prosperous dreams.

"What? Exotic hens?" Niddler hacked over the immense sparks stabbing through his nerves. "But Mantus is a different speci-Yellow-wing, don't you know how it works? I mean...about the minga-melons and the Janda-fruit...?" All he could do was bashfully hide his interest.

"Ah? Uhh...no." Yellow-Wing ceased, briefly thinking about his act. His avid tone then reversed to a serious neutrality.

Yellow-Wing is a careless planner, all you need to do is tell him his faults. When in doubt, Mother always knows best. Niddler remembered his father, Artifice's advice on trusting Queen Aysha and the Future Mother of Us All. "Mother...hmm." Niddler smiled cleverly as he laid a finger to his chin. "Want to find out who your real mates are?" The rainbow flyer threw out a labored squawk.

"Well, well, Ioz. It appears this is the end for you." Bloth atrociously reproached. The scowling frame of the sable-locked troublemaker kneel in front of the prodigious giant, a pair of marauders had restrained Ioz by the arms. He stretched out the paramount Sword of Primus by the hand, teasing the underdog on the ground by floating it in between the nose and himself. "I'll be taking this, of course, but you should be overjoyed to know that you'll soon be joining your dear father." The poignant taunts of the outrageous cutthroat did not rest as he returned the Sword to his back.

"Just end it." With his chin descending to the boards Ioz grit in wait of the moment his drab eyes would be eternally sealed, and he would not cry.

"The best part about it was that I never needed to lay a hand on him." The infamous warlord rolled with a jolly. "Anyone who tries to rebel against the new Rule of Mer will of course, suffer such unfortunate mishaps..." He trailed his phrase a last time before swinging his gaze at the hostile strife of Mantus and Zoolie, which lined the opposite edge of the transport.

Ioz sunk down in defeat before he validated his zeal. With the surviving morsel of durability within him, he hurtled to his feet, beating back the ensnaring louts with inapt effort. He retrieved the cutlass from the floor, he recklessly growled. Ioz slashed away at the opposite blade when the melody came from behind, an unmistakable ahoy. Big brother. Without thinking, he instantly snapped around. "Solia! No!" He desperately screamed. He reversed his stance after being seen in a position of weakness but the knife was coming down. This would be his last stand. Utterly amazed when smoke filled the air, dusky eyes widened in opportunity. He moved speedily. "You killed my father, kreld-eater..." He softly began. With one rip of steel at Bloth's retracted back, he listened to the most marvelous clank he ever did hear. "And I just killed your chance of taking over Mer!" He dangerously outcried. The Sword of Primus cleared the aft of the brute in the direction of Solia, who annexed the catch with a gleamed smile to her brother. Bloth paused promptly in a horror-struck condition before he furiously hacked away at Ioz, who was evenly forced backward by the meeting of metal.

"Get that wench!" Bloth yelled as Solia vaulted over the ledge, off the ship and onto the shore. Ioz stood in the way.

"Not happening." Ioz prosperously gloated, beaming in awe at the retreating sibling. That was his sister, his thieving sister with the smoke-beetle. The cloud of flunkies from the docked frigate scurried after the shadow that began to evaporate into the wisp. He grinned as he reeled about to fend off another blow. His eyes set on an outlandish scene. He spotted a clam shell.

Mantus and Zoolie kept steady with the clatter of swords for a lengthy period. "Yes, Lord Bloth. Ioz has a...pretty." Mantus hissed wretchedly. He inclined his scheming eyes at his boss, who was being taken out. He tried to split for the Sword, which was now retreating in the arms of the young pirate-girl. "Useful addition!" He fervidly gnashed, battering at the razor obstruction in front of him to break.

"Don't you even think about it! I'm gonna make you scream like a little girl!" Zoolie effectively defended, crushing Mantus's attempts of retreat.

"Natchut!" The commander roared gruelingly. "Out of my way bilge-breath leech! You won't defeat me, give up!" The treacherous but beaten Mantus snarled hotly. He felt as if he was losing, and he was. He insidiously gnarled, nearly at the end of his wits as Zoolie vigorously staggered him with the blade. "Die, maggot! I'll send you to the depths of the ocean!" Mantus seared and for once, the master swordsman was defeated by the fiery barman.

"Sorry Mantus, but I have other things I need to do!" Zoolie announced proudly as he deflected attack so rigorously it compelled the lank commander to spin in attempt to regain footing. "This should pay for damages!" While Mantus tried to gather his sealegs, Zoolie lopped at the pouch of gold coins on the opponent's hip and knocked it away. He caught the loot with his hand and chuckled deeply. He fought off more advancing pirates, making short work of the fray.

"You!" Mantus screamed coarsely, throwing a fit as he slammed his sword upon the ground. He growled with unending rage.

"Ioz! Help!" Niddler's bay sung out from the stern. Ioz promptly ducked down, causing Bloth to thrust steel into the plank.

"Noy jitat!" Ioz cursed as he neared the rim of the predicament, Jargis and Slaggon did not even notice his advance. Both were engrossed in making merry over the monkeybirds' suffering and scheming future projects. In that conclusive instant, both repugnant faces expressed a dread of the next motion to come. Ioz tore away the husk from the tyrant and plunged it into the onyx sea.

"I owe you, Ioz!" Niddler gratefully squawked. He soon propelled the net away from himself and Yellow-Wing. This time, the rival monkeybirds screeched and zoomed at Jargis and Slaggon. The slavers withdrew on their own vehicle.

"This won't be the last you see of us!" Jargis and Slaggon threatened in unison, shaking fists from the sky. The sail of butterfly drew up into the lofty beyond.

The rebel avians floated to the planking, red plumage lifted and whispered to a right-hand ear. "Monkeybirds." Yellow-wing nodded at the sound. "Janda-fruit..." With a shy noise Niddler donned a fuzzy shutter. "Minga-melons..." Yellow-Wing frowned at the chattering of a fowl beak. "Eggs." The sunny monkeybird remained motionless as the modest male finished his explanation and fluffed his crimson tail.

"What?!" Yellow-wing crossed his arms and ruffled his feathers.

"Well that's one Treasure." Ioz asserted his aspirational zeal, preparing for the second round with the stout pegleg who aimed for his throat. He bounded over Konk as the piglet tried to drive him away with a trident. He pounced for the overweight runt, only to jut eyes on the enraged and gargantuan Captain storming for him. Konk bunged the Treasure, Mantus then snatched it up after lifting up his own handle.

"Don't worry, I'm not letting him get you this time!" Niddler hollered fiercely as he strove to aid efforts, but found himself confronted with a golden renegade instead. Yellow-Wing swat him down and erected on two primate claws, looming over.

"Because of you, the rest of that rebel army you caused to rise up on Pandaawa tarred and plucked me!" Yellow-Wing grit his beak as he rampaged. "Do you know how long it takes feathers to grow back borca-breath?! Ten months! Ten agonizing months! Now you're going to pay for it!" Yellow-Wing screeched and closed in on Niddler, arranging himself to scoop the competitor up and cast him into the sea of dark water as a last act of vengeance. Before the devious avian could discern what had began to happen, Niddler flashed a victorious smile. Instead, the huge swarm of monkeybirds dove down and carried off the yellow villain-bird as he screamed in agony.

"Yellow-Wing!" Mantus flung forward for the chance he may reach Yellow-Wing before he would be snatched from him to the outside.

"M-Mantus, I've figured something out! Monkeybirds can't have harems, the manship is over! Sorry mate! Agguhhhuhhhh!" Yellow-Wing bawled as the infinite wings swooped. Mantus groaned as he looked overhead, a fit of distress decimated his hope.

Niddler sat proudly. Konk dove for Niddler, who was now being left alone on the scaffold. Niddler flit off with a squawk. He then circled and boosted up Konk, whom he chucked into the surrounding rim of teal waves. The piglet attempted to stumble back out. "This is for Ren!" Niddler fearlessly cawed, returning and swinging down from the sky to smite Bloth with the same loose dowel Jargis had employed. The atrocious lord failed to return a strike and left another opening for Ioz to assault.

"Hand it over, Mantus. Unless you want your last heist to involve gilda-pedaling in your own beard-looping bilge." Zoolie heroically directed, guarding the path from the ridge where the swordsman had scurried to. Mantus reviled with a gnarl of despise, refusing to relent.

"Up with that plank, you scuttle-brains!" The Captain flurried to the rest of his disarrayed crew to pull up the gangplank. He disconsolately lurched from needing to fight off both the delightfully bloodthirsty Ioz and Niddler, who again whacked him as if he wished to split the swollen tummy open. The claw of the line that was previously propelled over a spar by Zoolie had unknowingly become cast upon the brunet swashbucklers's neck ornament.

"I'll get you!" Quarreled a random and stubby wharf-rat out of the woodwork, who was shooting to knock the innkeeper down. One hit to the frivolous rascal's gut from Zoolie would have him quelled to the floor.

"You take care of the other Treasure. I'll keep this up until we can find Tula and Solia." Ioz ascertained the formation to the warm ally next to him, with a mutual nod. He swept away from an effective kick Bloth had composed to plow him over. Ioz backpedaled toward the perimeter of the railing, he depressed his foot over the edge of the swaying plank.

Mantus surveyed his quandary. Overhead his position swung a halyard annexing a batch of hanging crates over the board, directly underneath was the cable connecting to the hookline upon Ioz. "I'll let you collect it..." Mantus seethed as he palmed out the agreeable hand with the shard to present it to the easing bard. He briefly blinked his vision and darted his head away as he generously ceded. Zoolie reached out a leery fist before laying a finger on the smooth surface.

"Good Mantus, maybe you'll just convince me you've chang-Noy jitat! Daven's beard, you sick-grimy seadog!" Zoolie had merely groped the Treasure in his palm with a kind word when upon granting it, Mantus leapt up the mast and severed the net holding several weights full of stock-and-board. The collection of timber boxes crashed over the strung twine, tightening it's slack. Ioz was now hoisted up by his neck over the plank and barely on his toes as he struggled to lessen the strangling strain on his airflow with meaty palms. The assaulter dropped to the ground with a pounce and a spit.

"But Ioz will die!" Mantus sizzled with a chary ultimatum as he pushed his golden sole over the inception of the ramp, toying with tipping it into the clumping spots of nipping slew. "Choose wisely, or your favored mutineer dances the Hempen Jig over a river of black. Now, hand Back. The Treasure, Zoolie." The soulbearing cutthroat steamed with the gelid stare, he spread out his quarter-spoked palm in anticipation.


	16. Submergence

Chapter 13 EPIC END PART 3

THE SPIRIT - THE CURSE

PART 3 WRECKAGE

Part 1 Phorlock's Doom

"Let him go, Mantus." Zoolie stipulated gingerly. "Your only friend flew the coop, so now you're disappointed. Here, you want this?" To bargain, Zoolie lobbed back the gold he had stolen from Mantus. The underhanded thief caught it with an unhappy scour.

"Noo-o!" Ioz shook what he could of his head to protest, despairingly trying to ease the shock of the duress on his windpipe as his boots dangled from the sole and up.

"Well twist my soul, looks like fate has favored us again!" Bloth began to heartily chuckle as he observed the spectacle. He casually swatted Niddler away. "Ow!" He irately shouted after a bite.

"Ioz! Stop worrying about your neck!" Zoolie suddenly demanded. Mantus lit up with a slippery fleer.

"So, Zoolie, you'd sooner have your friend hang than give up your Treasure. It seems I've misjudged your ruthless heart." Mantus laughed with preposterous amusement. "Maybe you'd do well to be back on Bloth's and our crew, how about it-what?!" The fraudulent second-in-command's scream then ended after his heel brushed the connecting slat.

Punches pounded with bubbling grunts beneath the sweeping tide. The struggle of bladesmen's sinking fists aspired to pull one under to a demise. One man swam to the crystalline surface before the ebb crashed out and sunk the loser, but atop of the fracas a tricky half-pint awaited the victor's return.

"Thanks, friend. You saved my life again." After releasing his fingers from his throat to catch the Treasure of Rule, Ioz collapsed on the wood momentarily with a gracious thank-you. "Chungo lungo!" He glimpsed at the vanquishing stream below before excitedly rolling back into action, springing up from the water splashing his knees. The victim of Mantus's noose had been clobbered for the glassine shard on his ascent up from the bedraggled panel in that time. The Treasure slipped from Ioz's hand and into a midget's, a captain claimed the sleek gemstone.

"Aaaahhh!" The same opportunistic bystander who had been completely destined to the boards underfoot wailed as he bumped his cranium on the bulwark where the commander was formerly poised and he faded into unconsciousness. Off the slab of the gangplank could be heard a lower bawl.

"Whataddya say Mantus, want to place a bet? How about all or nothing? 50 of your own says you won't feel a thing until that jitatan sniffin-ring of yours touches the threshold! Here, we can play with one, and I'll tow you with the other! I have two hands after all, and coordination!" Zoolie happily suggested to the cries babbling from the spot of ominous slop. He displayed the pilfered coins with pride. Mantus glowered through gaping moans of misery and total fear.

"You're too nice, Zoolie. I wouldn't be so forgiving. I think we should see if anyone else wants to offer more!" Ioz made a playful counter proposal. He laughed, watching at the sidelines of the commander wallowing in dark water.

"It doesn't matter, watch him." Zoolie flatly responded to the man at his side, eyes shifting to the show that was already in motion. Ioz resumed a mundane posture.

"Both of you traitors will suffer when I'm through with you!" Bloth coughed as he seated himself from his disorganized state when he saw Tula bounding closer, not far behind her were numerous ships that were now disembarking. His jaw dropped.

"Get me out of here, you smool-brains!" Mantus wailed at the peak of his lungs as he helplessly attempted to tread through the victimizing black-mud.

"You wouldn't share your ale with us, Mantus. Why should we share our ship?" One meager buccaneer taunted.

"Aye Mantus, you're greedy as a sea-eatin' paunch-fish. Why should we save ye? Bloth owes us for keeping us bored! Booo!" Another looter rallied, the pair of hooligans continued to heckle Bloth and Mantus.

"Zoolie! I'll take your offer of eight-million, to save me, and I'll do as you wish! I stole the Guyfoo capsule from the Wraith after the Maelstrom wreckage! It transformed into an Ocarina of Dark Ecomantic powers...I know you need it." Mantus pathetically pleaded for a bargain, for he could do no more than push away at the fetid ocean's throat.

"Is that hope I hear? I think the total payoff is down to one piece now, and you can only have a drabul bonus if you join our side. I'll save your crusty barnacles, but you get nothing for it. Done?" Zoolie offered his conditional support, Mantus instead spat.

Bloth panicked and hustled to Konk, who had just clambered up the shoreline, tossing the Treasure back to the munchkin. "Set him loose!" The gruff master ordered to the piglet, who did as told. Ioz and Zoolie pursued hurriedly down the ladder with Niddler following to the rear. Everything that had been predicted had come to pass as Konk raced to free Mantus with the Treasure of Rule, but it was all too sudden as the body of the dark water became like an inhaling rift when it wrapped around Mantus's tangled arm.

"Back up!" Zoolie and Ioz cringed as they watched Mantus thrash and shed ear-ripping screams.

"By the two moons!" With what revulsion could be withheld under even Ioz's pity, he abandoned his obsessive stare.

The fleeing pirate grabbed and threw Konk aboard the ramp of the frigate. "Come, Mantus! We need to go!" Bloth urgently roared. Mantus's screaming lessened as Bloth unpredictably dragged him away by his lank wrist. To the stun of the surviving trio the pernicious two hightailed for an undisclosed location before the troop of resistance could catch up.

"Fork over the Treasure, Konk!" Ioz called aloud as he charged after Konk up the gangplank, his energy had been starting to wane as he pressed himself up. "Niddler, you look for Tula and Solia!" He signaled to the nodding monkeybird to act as he roughly ensnared the munchkin by the collar.

"Uhhh. Me no have it." With shifty eyes Konk blathered. "Hah! Zoolie still mad because Mantus take Zoolie wench dangle-earrings and make her cry while running laps around deck so we can eat fishdinner. Me wanted tasty grub, busybody!" Konk spat at Zoolie, and failed to land it.

"Where is Mantus's, new prize, too?" Zoolie demanded, shaking the runt. It appeared that Konk had indeed hid the Treasure in that brief period, it was not on him. "I don't know how ye can think sixty-seven times around the jitatan Maelstrom on Thumbbites wasn't enough for everyone, among other things. Where'd Commander Chungo take her?!" He brashly incited Konk with a hazardous excitement.

"She is with me! Konk is popular with the ladies! More so These Days!" The braggart pegleg postured with a stupid and distracting chuckle.

"Rightt'. And I'm a half-tispy urchinlubber." Zoolie mockingly dismissed, quite unimpressed.

"I can't, Ioz!" The shrill cry expelled with a presence of a painful threshing. Ioz glared premeditatedly.

"Traitor Ioz!" The interrogating duo lashed around at the source of the sound and spotted a four-armed deformity. "You're no real pirate. You drink, gamble and steal but you don't pillage and you don't raid. Killing you will be a nice wake-up surprise! After I feed our baby Constrictus a nice monkeybird-snack!" Strand hectored as he surfaced from the hold of the vessel, cleaving in two of his eight arms a dragonbow with a piercing bolt attached. Under his third, he secured a cage bearing a miniature flesh-eater. Gnashes and shrieks exploded from the halfway-encasing trap. Niddler wrenched by the throat, suffocating solidly inside the forth. Bloodied pincers clacked from a malicious scorpionrat in his adult metamorphosis.

"And you do, kreld-eater." Ioz digressed as he emerged from a ducked-down stance on the deck. "By my father's shed-blood, you do." With the last gritty phrase he uttered, Strand and the coop disappeared off the ridge of the Wave's bow. The drowning apostate's uproar could be heard before it melted entirely. Ioz dropped the second launching-arch back to the former placement on the ground. Spare harpoon-line clacked to the boards when Niddler hurried back to his post. Silence emitted.

"No, I watch." With jubilation Konk added on. "And bet." The pigface continued, to the ire of both heroes. "And drink." Konk replied with a grin. "Ok, me never got turn..." He foully growled. The ship had startlingly began to pull out.

"Why you..." Ioz sordidly simmered. He caught the runt again and smacked a fist with the opposite hand, anticipating an acquisition of harbored information.

"Let's leave him to his blubber, Sure-Shot. He's the least of our worries." Zoolie veered from the travesty, turning a mind to the more crucial matter. "You feel that?" He switched to his friend to question, the boat began to roll.

"You get out now or you be stuck away from bird and wench! And...Ren." Konk guilefully taunted. More of the weakened pirates were stabilizing on the floorboards.

"Where is Ren, Konk?! Tell us now! We don't have time for games, piglet!" Ioz hit Konk in the tubby gut, groaning in a fatigued volume. The shrimpy man glared, then smirked.

"Me don't know, Bloth and Mantus do." Konk gratingly prattled, he smacked Ioz and freed himself from the tight cinch. He rubbed his forehead as he tapped away.

"Chungo lungo." Ioz swore as he encountered the yawing of the boat steering out. He and the barkeeper vaulted overboard before the mass of monstrous ooze could totally encircle the craft. "Noy jitat." Ioz's eyes grew wide as he peered up, letting out a disturbed reaction. "I don't want to know what that is, but I think we're going to find out." He rigidly indicated. He observed the sky far above as he shoved his way to shore. Two dragons glided in the breeze.

From the waterside, a woman and an avian stood awaiting. The flood of crews in the distance had started to congregate, the fleeing frigate of the antagonist faction sped away into waves of dark water.

"They showed up!" Tula joyfully revered the manifold bevy of monkeybirds that was flying out. The magnificent swarm dove for where Bloth and Mantus had dispersed but from what the heroes could see through the trees, a puff of smoke appeared and it seemed that vision was obscured. The two villains vanished. "I don't think they heard me." Tula faintly informed her colleague.

"They'll eventually learn you can't use your powers." Niddler referred to the pair of waterborne shipmates. He clutched with him a strong cane. "I'll go after them." He volunteered with the concurrence of his crewmate. Niddler flapped away into the rush of wind.

Off the coast, the friendly troublemakers hastened. Dark water impelled to return over the clean section of waves, rolling back fast as the parting frigate traced a route from the berm.

"Where did they go?" Tula cried vitally abound as she caught up, she had just vaguely been paying attention to their conversation as she arrived.

"Noy jitat!" Ioz responded with a startled wobble. "I got it back, Tula!" The exhausted Ioz blazed to an out-of-breath Tula, who he then learned was carrying the Sword in her arms. "Unfortunately the dartha-eel got away..." He wearily admitted. He twisted to squint at the spot of sea where Bloth's vessel was being ferried away by Konk, who had retained some support from the pirate crew.

"I know, Solia helped!" Tula confessed as she tried to catch a break. She smiled at Ioz's sister and former competition. "Everyone, something is wrong! I can't use my ecomantic abilities, they're being blocked by something!" Tula squeezed out.

"You've missed a lot, woman. Mantus still has the Ocarina of Dark Ecomancy and only he and Bloth can get to Ren. Konk has the 12th Treasure, and he has vanished. We seem to be in the Taikal forest of Octopon. Any manner of beasts may attack us here, including that demon of the sky. For now we just have to find where they went, and pray we can take them on this time. Right this moment, we need to find shelter." Ioz quickened to clue in Tula as he blazed the trail outward.

Pipes dribbled to the inside of a sullen compartment as it's guests watched the rats scampering through cramped impasses and dining on remains of vermin.

"Only a drop from doubt after two days?! This will take forever!" Bloth fumed at the sight of a mere bead of power from a liquefied Treasure of Rule.

"I can't override Ren's free-will, Bloth. He will not forfeit the Treasure inside." Kauldron advised the Pirate King, his windmill eyes dulled and ceased to spin as he twisted out of a stare at the honorable lad.

"I'll show him free!" Bloth snarled as he readied his blade to rip through the nearest obstruction, Ren pressed backward into the musty wall.

"Bloth, this isn't right! I beg of you, stop while you can, please!" The prince groveled in chains. This magician with the strange eyes was helping Bloth drain the River of Rule from his soul. Bloth ferociously craved the entire element within Ren but if he ever thought of the idea to drink a single drop, he didn't want to know what would happen to Mer.

"If you cause him pain, he will only resist me more." Kauldron warned his master as he strode to an opposite position. Bloth clanged his sword to the ground.

"You can't oppose me forever, Ren." Bloth's threat chilled to the bone. The immense warlord peered at the second form attached to the ground by bulky chains wrapping feet and the one massive lock that conjoined them both. "As for you, Mantus, it is no surprise you have failed me but to rob me under the keel is not very dutiful of you. I said you could buy the Maelstrom when I owned exactly One billion gold coin, not One short." Bloth heartily teased the awakened guard on the ground with a sword, threatening to behead. "You're not deserving of death, after I use Ren's control of the Thirteen Treasures, there will be little need for the keeping of change. You shouldn't be moving around, at least not until you have fully healed." He casually chuckled, seeing nothing to disrupt his murderous mood as he carried away through the steel door. He callously flicked the single drabul from his thumb, allowing it to land under Mantus's trembling palm. Ren felt an uncanny sympathy for the broken trickster.

"If you look into my eyes, Ren, I can release you from those chains." Kauldron must have assumed the commander was in too much pain because he sought to strike a deal with the boy against the stone confine. Mantus listened at the crook of his prudent lobes.

"Thanks, but I think I'll take my chances." Ren denied the malevolent servant and glared into fickle pupils. None of these people were his friends, surely he was all alone now. Kauldron shrugged and recited a petty Suit Yourself.

Mantus's nauseous glare pronged at Bloth's egress, he swept the gold piece to his waist with a shudder. Sweat from sweltering anguish washed over him as he moaned and dragged himself up to a recline. After brushing a compartment under his sleeve and freeing the contents, he immediately got to task on picking the lock over his boot.

"Have you seen enough of Bloth yet?" Ren judged the later state of Mantus's injury. Though he murmured, he would have winced because he could see what was underneath the flimsy silk of the ribboned sleeve.

"Hardly, boy." Mantus hacked achingly as he arose from the pavement and left.

Glowfish lit within a quaint shack in a wilderness unexplored by man or beast. Shouts and movement grew into hubbub.

"This King's Captain thinks Bloth is able to bring back the Maelstrom, with a Magician is what he said. You know as well as I do that ship has already sunk but Bloth isn't one to quit while he is ahead. Maybe we'll get lucky and dark water will sink his new keel but judging by the lack of spectacle in these storm-bound skies of abyss, I'd say that hasn't happened." Ioz weighed in on the predicament he and Zoolie encountered on the road to Taikal, the ecomancer sensed a risk as he again sat in his seat. He grumblingly soothed an insidious headache.

"I've seen The Eyes of Fallen Captain once on deck of a rental ship, Ioz. It's a natural illusion of the clouds but I didn't know you knew that many ships in a wreck on the seas of Tayhoj or Kalinda, I never would have guessed the show happens over every capsize in the middle of the night." Tula tried her insightful bewilderment on Ioz's conjecture, this wouldn't be the first time the craven-hearted swashbuckler believed in some unfounded sea-mythos.

"Surely men do not bring openbars to water-fights, nor water-fights to brigmaster's britches." The dice-toad burped up a roll.

"All eights pay three-to-one!" Ioz merrily shoved in a minor portion of Mantus's gold.

"The house'll deal you double payout if you make that an even. Ya know it is a weird thing about this shack hidden in the middle of the Taikal Forest of Octopon with the gamer-legger inside, it was like someone built it just for us." Zoolie wagered at the table in the middle of the sunken room as he discovered the defensive corners, which would shield against most violent impacts. Solia fussed over dripping rain outside the window.

"This is my idea. I'll lure them out through Taikal, Bloth should be easy to trick. When I'm close enough, I'll knock away the ocarina from Mantus with my knife. Then, we'll ambush." Tula finally proposed the scheme she had worked out to the specifics. It was a well-rounded course of action, she did not believe she needed to concern herself with adverse opinions.

"Trickery won't work on your part, they're too tough for you. We need to ambush them first. Leave the ocarina to Zoolie and I, we know those kreld-eaters and how to handle them like the morning sun. This is no hook game like last time, our crew is smaller and the enemy can be anywhere because there is no leviathan-corpse landmark to watch by. You stay in the back and bind them ecomantically after we have them down." To the stun of his partner, Ioz disagreed in a crinkle of his rocky gaze. Tula bore a grieved frown at him finding a fault in her idea.

"That doesn't make any sense, how am I supposed to stop him with my ecomancy if I can't use it?! You said yourself, Ioz, the dark water ripped Mantus's arm clean-off! Isn't the time to go right now?" Tula snapped at the seafarer who was more engrossed in swapping dice than listening to her.

"I said after we have them down. I wouldn't say something I didn't mean, do you have any idea how difficult it is to track either one of them? Mantus is out for vengeance on all of us and Bloth wants nothing more than to tyrannize every man and woman under his control!" Ioz was close to loosing patience as he slammed his fist on table.

"Then let's go! You've been playing reef-roll with Zoolie since black-dawn!" Tula insisted for just one courtesy and rolled that single die on the boards by the swashing boots, why Ioz had upset her so with this she could never be fully sure.

"I've already told you we can't go right now, you try fighting off thirty landlubbers and their dock-harpies! This risky high-tide is no chungan time to lose our necks. Chungo, a woman doesn't know the difference between reef-flowers and bilge-gold." Ioz could only swipe on his game lost but he unkindly mumbled to his own, judging the argument moot in present time.

"You've always supported Ren and braved through the worst storms, so why are you giving up on him in his time of need? What is the matter with you, you-you bigoted-minded sea-slug?!" The rattle of terse woe left Tula with a hapless solution Ioz wouldn't budge from and even he would hone on the truth Ren would not be unbound without a tactic.

Tula slunk silently but with a rude cough Ioz cleared his throat. "What is the matter is that you have a woman's mind, Tula. Ren is a man, he doesn't need an aft-spun wench throwing herself in his place. If you try to find Ren alone and now, you'll find yourself into iron chains straight alongside him. I suppose you also forgot everything you knew about Bloth in that fleeting ecomantic-world of yours. Do you think Bloth cares about whether any of his conquests are willing to submit to playing his plundered trophy? He'll skin you alive after he's done letting he and his cronies take away every living scrap of your seen, and unseen." Though the hardy sailor yearned for endless wealth at caprice, he forbid all of the frivilous fearlessness Tula possessed when she skipped aside the table like nothing had been said.

"No, Ioz. This is...stupid. I'm sorry you're not man...or bold enough to go after your captain, who has saved your life many more times than you've ever deserved it, you cowardly kreld-pig! I'm not giving up on him...because sometimes, loosing your life is a small price to pay." Tula skittered a ledge out, a livid muck dwell in her lost fate. For Ren it would mean anything beyond and for her, everything.

"You foolish grub-flora, you have worse to lose than your life. Do as you will. It might be my worn salty-ears but you changed your shanty from when Ren left and I was the only sea-man on Mer you wanted to sail with." Ioz lowered his indomitable glint above some enigmatic and cagey bluff from a subjective lass of his desire, he now chose not to disregard.

"So? What?! I suppose you want me to waggle like a barmaid for you while I refill your mug!" Tula's pulse ran like steaming glaciers on an out-of-touch Ioz, he was still harping on their session in Takrar-town. How dare he mention that or bring it out considering her heart was weak then, but strong now.

"Good idea, woman." Ioz shore no face or eyes at the rowing charmer, only a stiffened back.

"So I guess that means you don't think I can handle myself, well guess what! While you're sitting on your superior tail and chatting with your drinking-mate, I'm finding Ren!" Tula furiously slammed the door, having enough of Ioz's mock chauvinism.

"Then take Niddler with you, jitata-female! Fine...go alone like the ballast-klutz you are but when Bloth makes you his cabin-tramp don't expect me to be the jitatan-fool to save your bilge-wallowing skin!" Ioz growled at the stubborn ecomancer. He had made a stupid remark, so he was a jitatan kreld-pig. Whatever. Tula could handle herself, apparently. "I would like to see her do anything completely by herself, and without the help of Ren or me." He grumbled to Zoolie and Solia as the nature-charmer fled.

"No thank you, Ioz!" Tula soured with nothing but pure bitterness as she lunged away faster than even Niddler could follow or find her.

"Sorry, Ioz." Niddler returned to his tough colleague with drooping wings, bearing unfortunate news.

"Don't you think we should go after her? You know who could be out there. Forgive me for saying this, but this jungle where we're docked...ain't no shore-scuffle." Zoolie fidgeted reluctantly as he listened to droplets swatting thatch and glass.

"Let her try to find him, she doesn't want our help but she will when she finds out I'm right. She'll be back, I'm sure. We have to hide from that sky-creature, while we can." Ioz exchanged sore words with a sister and two bestfriends. His stare moved to the cracked window-pane, the pink wonder had erased from his universe in that moment.

Tula stomped off alone to grounds untold. It seemed as if the Ruins of Taikal would refill her ecomantic virility, she was away from that flying creature. To console her frustration she grew a flower, later deciding to pluck and smell it. It did not make her any more calm but on this occasion she felt she could at least do something with her gift, even if it was only a simple act of beauty. She was dwelling over what Ioz had told her, about how she was only good when she was throwing water or tying up enemies with vines. Tula knew how to steal, she stole the Treasure of Rule from Ioz and Zoolie before and probably could have stolen it back from Bloth, were she given the opportunity. Maybe Ioz didn't even mean anything by his harsh words but she was as good enough thief as him, and someday she would prove it. Tula cooled her heels, flopping down for a breather below an Umbrellawood's canopy.

Bloth...she knew how to deal with Bloth, his advances toward her were so predictable-oh so predictable for a male scoundrel. Tula would pull it off. She had almost done it before, right?

"Wench, the sword! I can't kill it on my own!" So sudden was when Tula heard a roar, then a scream. The dynamic enchantress withdrew the clefting knife from her pouch, ready to strike. She identified a wild beast with a goat's head, a big and terrible one at that, but she did not spot where the distressed moan was coming from. She dashed away from the animal's line of attack, but caught herself in a slip onto the mossy floor of the jungle. Straining her neck to the left, a glint of metal touched her perspective. It was a shiny cutlass. She scattered to her toes and connected the weapon with a figure, a recognizable...Quin. "Please!" The injured man begged her with fluid eyes, black locks were mangled with stains of crimson sweat. His clawing front was locked between twin tree-trunks. Push or pull, he could not budge. Mantus was sprawled out over the dirt and unable to reach, the Ocarina of black ecomancy was still on him.

Tula debated mentally over the misery of the one-armed commander. Ioz had told her once to stay away from Mantus, but never explained to her why. She was aware Mantus was mean, the cruelest pirate beneath Bloth himself but only that extent she knew. She wouldn't risk saving him, but she needed that whistle. It might have been possible to repel the scavenger, but she wasn't sure if she could eventually fend off every monster on her own. Besides...he was fatally wounded, being an ecomancer meant never wishing death on any life. With her boot she carefully kicked the blade to his reedy fingers, keeping her distance.

Mantus revived from the tumble, clutching the hilt and swiping at the threatening mutant. He yelled when his assault failed, Tula could now figure out why. Leaves and bracken went up in a flare, igniting rings of smoke through the branches. Sharply behind the club-wielding goat-cretin was a lone Fire Entity. Quickly thinking, the ecomantress pulled a slim brook from the soil and targeted it at the spirit. The mammalian hube bleated and clapped away from the blazing demon, one troublemaker down. The steam stagnated the curse's flame and shrank it to an insignificant blot, dispersing into the wind.

Polar irises spied Tula's blowing tresses settle into their proper placement over her scalp. The weakened cutthroat gasped as he moved the dark instrument, seeing to it that he did not prevent her from using her skill and thus from his rescue. "Kayraadin never saw the jewelry-market in Janda-town. She was third-mate on the Maelstrom. Valuable, as Ioz would know. I don't have any Eel-blood so you don't need to worry about her fate becoming yours." Mantus was lying spread-eagle on his back to display his lanky arms above his hanging earlobes. He planned to assure his savior that he meant her no harm, and to let her inspect.

"Kayraadin? I don't remember Ioz ever mentioning her." Tula involuntarily helped the grounded Mantus off his disarrayed sway, offering her hand but showing interest in how he managed to fix himself in such a travail. It was not because she was nice. She could swallow danger emanating en masse from him but because she needed that whistle in a similar form that she needed to air to survive, other options did not outshine the chance for a trick and a promise. She would prove herself to Ioz, and reclaim the physical peril to her confidence in the process.

"I need to get to an inn in Octopon city...of course I won't tell Bloth about our encounter, if you assist me." Mantus sneered as the gentle palm extracted to his own mangy mitt in a seal of their deal, this Andorian wench failed his test. She had already bought his help lower than Ioz or himself would have. Mantus would never save anyone's life, and certainly not for mere amnesty. Expecting a conflict in distance, he trampled on backward tread until he was again a safe width apart from her.

"Agreed." Tula uneasily spied her unlikely accomplice, showing him a nod of her slender chin. Mantus was taller than Tula was, ferociously trained in combat and despite his build, heavier. Still, Tula was proud of being an Andorian warrioress. Cheating was her middle name, and she would have that Ocarina before the night passed, by herself.

Far behind where the ecomancer's footsteps would vanish perpetually, two men and a young thief hiked about a separating shoreline. No suggestion that larger ships had even sailed the water's line was there. No struggles or tracks had been left, but a view of burning wasteland continued to float on the purview.

"These fertile Yule-seeds should leave a sufficient clue of where we went, if Tula is as skilled with ecomancy as I think she is. It's much better than slicing up trees to mark our trail when a demon or a leviathan can follow us, anyway. That might have been the only break we'll have. It's not much of an oasis, I feel like a wreck. All my life I knew this evil sea would consume me and take me to my real end, friend. This I could predict, ever since that time. Solia..." Ioz shimmied up to the sandbank, resting on a rock as he sighed. He niched a tiny spore into the ground and arose.

"Oh come on, silly Ioz. It was just a nightmare, remember? I'm not afraid of dark water, now! Not at all! Not me!" Solia grinned wide as she laughed entertainingly, she tripped aside on boot and in forefront of the leading pass.

"After all, the most fatal mistake he made besides Mizar's jump was a twinkle before Kayrn' came aboard. That Phorlock captain, who broke out with help from someone from his home nation. You know those two flunkies who failed to detain the knightly chum on a scrimpy moonrise when Mantus was on shore-training with him...? He only finagled her rank after they were both tossed to the pit, I'll bet because he knew that rescuer who wore a flower-charm in her hair wouldn't return for my lass. Such a big sea-scandal it was for him." The barkeeper expressed, trudging through the waves and dragging up the waterside.

"I told you the sea-witch who rescued Phorlock from the brig keepers speaks bog-wash about him and Mantus being from her country. Quin women can never spell or pronounce their names without a sea-slug dangling from their 'Ayes, and they surely never fly dagrons or dirty their robes. Kayraa and Mizar were both from Octopon but even third-mate-Kayraa couldn't fight like Tula can." The drained voyager said in response to his nearby and less-stolid bestfriend.

"Can't figure out why, my mate. Kauldron brought up a good point. Mantus, being off his keel, probably took mind to get a price for that nonsensical loot Kayrn' sought me with, but to tell Bloth she stole and lost it overboard is a risk too far for his job and skin. It was a tall procedure to stab at this rudderless-rival." Zoolie sighed from being utterly lost. "They got some blubbering sandlubber to replace her after she was gone, I'll bet." Zoolie recurred with a hunch, ambling on the beach. He caught his breath.

"Who knows, that odious crook never missed me after my disassociation. It's been long since I've stopped going with him to that bethouse he frequents, for the sake of our repute and his obsession with foreign women. Jitatan sand-cretin Strand was appointed to assist after Kayraa was defrocked, I can tell you he was irksome on a few mercenary jobs with Joat when I was on my own. The piglet does most of the forward work currently. Vlor's around, but I haven't seen him of late...I doubt any of the old crew is anymore." Ioz offered with a consoling hum.

"They say my 'house is number one, and Drakkle's won't kick-out his one patron in Mantus. The Mangy Visitor and all of his lackey-buds haven't shown up for five years I know. It makes the customers noisy, sure, but Maars knows my standing strife with him anyway. Strand huh?" The weary Zoolie pried. Ioz nodded.

"Never imagined the two moons would grant me another life out of our civil-war at sea. No one has won still, but I doubt I'd be here today if Ren didn't change my doubts on the Treasures of Rule." Ioz motionlessly followed up, wiping the sea from his vision.

"Brother!" Solia fringed on the older scamp's shoulder, shaking him for reaction.

"Solia, settle down." Ioz complained and scooted away from the sassy nuisance. Zoolie turned at dagrons of white becoming clear as they brought a knight with a robed apprentice into the wind.

"Jazhea has been wounded and because there were words on it from this Mizar guy, she stole back the Arakna map Ren was carrying. It was written by Phorlock though and Mizar escaped when he received it from Mantus on the Maelstrom and he well...to me." Solia approached her prideful sibling, whispering a secret in his ear.

"He did what?!" The furious swashbuckler's eyes swelled with stun, Solia almost regret her wording. "Hives?! Hives? What about the hives...! Jitatan nightmare-eels!" Ioz clashed in round eyes like spheroids.

"Bloth already bamboozled us into telling him where the nightmare-eels were, mate. That warning is off the table now." Zoolie relented to precarious flack. "Besides, even Mantus said the sad old-fellow didn't know borca-paste about Primus's workings, and he was in charge of his interrogation in the brig. The poor soul ached for a lady at home, devoted son too if I recall. Mizar's articles were worth more to a Qui-Qua native and a Captain who knew how to look. Ay, Kuunda won't forgive me." He came to an epiphany as he carried away with the solo man on the battlefield.

"That entire Mizar incident was repulsive. What gives?" Ioz annexed his concern, trying balance his nerves between enjoining in the enigma and comforting an antsy little-sister. Solia hobbled ahead boot-first. He hauled a broken river-elk to the rapids, the scales of the deceased beast would be buoyant, yet sturdy enough to traverse the canals East of Taikal. The Delta of Scorpascia would lead them outside of the forest, and likely to their captured captain.

"Because, Ioz, Mizar, might I say the luckiest sea-scamp I've ever heard of, escaped Bloth. Even with the breach in his order, you'd be putting your life on the line if you were anyone with Bloth as your captain and any man who was assigned to guard that prisoner. I didn't know him personally, but Kayrn' insisted her old-chap wasn't off his boat and by Kuunda, I believe her." Zoolie swore by lack of uncertainty.

"This has something to do with that map of Arakna Ren used to find the River of Rule..." Ioz communed a trace of his own thoughts.

"Aye but there's something else on it a patron told me about...which means we have to go, and now, yes. I'm a denoba-rat for reneging on my promise to keep her map safe. Quin speech isn't Common and that Arakna map was scribbled with gantha-wash. Aye it's wrong, but this whole dagron-feeding-frenzy? It's 'All on me." Zoolie trailed on with a dingy emphasis. "'Ere!" The bartender flipped the confiscated bag of gold to the adumbral pirate at his side. "You'll need it more than I will, friend. I'm going after him! For good this time!" He swiftly announced as he started to run to the direction that the Pirate Lord's second-in-command had escaped.

"Not so fast, mate! Don't you talk like that again or you'll have my sword to face! Stow it. I have a Naja-Dog in this fight too." Ioz sternly rumbled, clipping his own blade in front of Zoolie's path. "Don't ever let me hear you say you're wrong. We threw that foul sea-slug of Ol' one jitatan blaze of a mutiny and we didn't do it for no reason at all." He stammered with a taut courage, a false reassurence.

"Hurry up!" Solia remarked in a burst of odious compound, a dribble above the crest oddly resembled the Eyes of the Fallen Captain.

"We did it for Kayraadin and Raymit, rest in Kuunda's ocean. For what would come to Mizar and Taneuka. For Treasure, and what was right. Don't put your honor on the line for that unfairness, Zoolie. Loosing it for that honorless bladesman would be a shame. Remember who you are, my friend. My own grudge would have vanished in the sea were it not for you and what you did way back when." Ioz reminded with an uplift, he glanced at the barman with the worn smile of an old acquaintance. Once it was never known, though he desired to bury the shady one in dirt the blood was Mantus and Mantus's wench to honestly uncover on why he had been so cruel.

"All this trouble is over me would-be ship-wife, who ate the sea over a Treasure map in grubby Mantus's home-blabber! Had I known it was written in jitatan Quin-speak I never would have tried to use it as a trading-token for Blue-Lip's assistance against his raidin' gambling-sprees on her, and I never would have scud the shardfish out of a tacky piece of gold!" Zoolie flustered with something of absolute abhorrence and daze.

"Well, Zoolie, I nearly smothered Scorrion in a bottled ship over a treasure map. It's part of being a pirate, you neverian mudworm. We fight them because they took two of our own, and are about to take another two." Ioz sympathetically offered relief.

"He's not insane, just an evil Thumbbites-shooting kelp-booter!" Zoolie petrified at the revelation dropping like a mountain.

"Mantus might be the cruelest pirate, my buddy, but he's not the evilest or the biggest one!" Ioz reassured with a friendly shoulder-punch, putting the matter into perspective. The man across from him seemed more succored. "We have unfinished business with two eyebrowless sea-hogs. We can't do it alone." The dusky seafarer struggled out through tired words. Ioz held out an open palm to Zoolie and with a moments pause, the red-head joined him in a hand-clasp of devoted comrades.

"Aye, don't worry about me. Danger is a sea-pup in a flood-basket. I'll knock 'is flanks out the right way. Just like I nearly did twelve years ago, and two before then." Zoolie vowed with courageous and kindled words. The warrior-duo unlocked their arms. He curled a long lock around his finger.

"Ahh...back when we used to have dreams, of a ship and a crew of on our own, and all the riches we could ask for! Just you and me and Kayraa...fond Taneuka. Back when Bloth still had two eyes, and a full head of hair. Things were so much different back then." Ioz commented thoughtfully, mottling back to days long past. "I was so close..." Ioz hardly groaned out, his expression held resentment and exhaustion, more so than usual.

"As was I." Zoolie tagged on.

"You should have finished it." Ioz sincerely bid.

"Save it." Zoolie instantly dismissed the notion. "Ye know that present of his he used for Kayrn', don't think he carries it with him anymore. 'Otherwise, we could really play this game." He spoke of something Ioz did not recognize.

"What present, Zoolie?" Ioz quizzically puzzled of the red-haired bartender.

"The present bird, sure-shot. It was his gift for being promoted, the one that remembered things. Remember our witness to the bet we gypped him on? He showed it to your father and Taneuka. It was the same one he used to record Kayr-" Zoolie began to explain something but needed to stop midway, someone else approached the near area. The squawking primate from the air fluttered down to face the separated travelers.

"This forest-fire is too repetitive. This is our path, ryahh!" Solia yelled as she slung her stone in it's net, allowing it to bowl unharmed through the torrential furnace that was blocking the way. Despite her fears of the dark water a breach of the thicket's guile by the pirate's sister would prove herself forevermore a necessity. She helped herself out.

"Well I'll be a monkeybird's uncle, the flames were an illusion." Zoolie declared showily at the untamed girl, of whom possessed thieving wiles which prevailed over the gentlemens' own.

Tula observed Bloth's main-combatant shredding his path through the tropical plain. Mantus was fast and even though he could only maintain use of his left arm, brush effortlessly depiled when he was in the lead. Tula couldn't keep herself from wishing she had just decided to sneak back to the base and let Ioz know where the ransacker was. She would just lift the whistle off of him, then she would find her way to Ioz. "How much farther is it to this inn?" Sliding her emerald eyes, she imposed on Mantus's indifferent semblance. Hopeful the expedition would not go on long, she would be granted her golden opportunity in time.

"Not far now. We'll go around Bloth's camp, but we won't be stopping." Mantus clarified by the pivot of his jaw. The enemies' alliance wasn't influenced by the surrounding dregs, but his state left nothing more than his muddy leer and overclothes obtrusive through the marsh muck.

"Eyuck." Tula didn't trust Mantus was going to any inn, at least not one that wouldn't involve leading her to Bloth first. She swatted a clot of bog flies from her sight as she lunged out of the mess. The scoundrel had just left the Ocarina hanging from his belt, clearly in view. It was like he wanted her to take it. She had come to terms that unlike before, she was unprepared. She didn't have any lizard or gaizer-pistol to bare against Mantus as she would have wished. She began to ominously regret going off on Ioz, it was over something foolish as her idea of ambush opperations being rejected. Now she was being led into uncharted woods for an evil flute, definitely not worth the price. Her toe hit a rock. In turn she retrieved a murky twig from a puddle of gunk on the tract, with agile fingers she undid the waistsash over her rouge skirt.

"It is peculiar that you are not with your teammates." The wistful chill of the pillager's lip broke Tula's mindfulness.

"Oh! Yeah, well...Ioz is in some tavern. Chasing women, somewhere..." Tula did not know what to say to the Pirate Lord's second-in-command, this situation was finding her more hassled as every moment dragged by. She faced his swerving grin as an earlier sundown took her away.

"Is it comfortable...woman?" Ioz had desired her input to proceed further in the chamber, no demands he sought at that time. He couldn't have gone back from the time he outlaid his sweltering palm on her hourglass measurements. She needed no enchantment to feel the heat in his ebony eyes, tender and nothing like the big-talk he let dictate his fervor. Inside the bunk sheets it was a yes or no question with a scroll's worth of answer.

It had begun with a hug, maybe a stroke on her hand. Ioz was the trifle to her temper so she had tried to share a goodbye with him but it didn't feel the way it should have, so he rolled off of her and they slept apart that night. Her friendship with Ren was innocent and uncomplicated as she and Ioz would have been if they hadn't both thought it was the End. It was her mistake, Ioz cared about nothing but her safety and happiness from the instant they had started on each other and yet she couldn't live with it. Somehow, every-single vision of that fond evening flashed before her in almond splotches.

"We are comparable. Ioz treats his wenches foul, I rather like foreign women because their golden jewelry is often hard to come by." Mantus wound to his original course, pointing to a shoreline conducted by a band of aggressive marauders and their sea-captain. "He's up further. I won't tell him you are here, but you will have to run." Mantus weaved out of a speaking distance for a seaside base.

"Understood." Tula rustled into thickets with a reflective hush, covering herself hindmost the collaborator's span. What a nightmare for any foreign woman.

"Lord Bloth." Mantus's hail could be listened to as Tula crept a pace behind. "I have found the boy's crew in the Taikal forest. The best plan for action is to lead them back to us before we set sail for El Scorpascia." He shrewdly approached the moored ship with his announcement.

"If you can find more men for the job, then do so. Recover those jitatan Treasures at all costs! I don't want to lose their location!" Hot-blooded orders thundered entirely from the cracking of waves to the disordered high-grasses.

"This is how I understand their interpretation...Mantus was the best swordsman, but he didn't know Ioz was the best marksman with a dragonbow at the time. Zoolie could take on six men at once, but he couldn't take down Mantus, he was just too skilled for him then. But now..." Concepts formed over the sea from a perplexing vision. The waiting enchantress witnessed holographic motions at the whim of an otherworldly voice. "I'm sure they have heard the story of the Quin prince who betrayed his countrymen. We will be sure to plan well, Bloth." The very almighty mirage of words manifesting as actual sight danced above the ship. Like memories in reality Tula could see disturbing places and pictures in animation, including the rose-haired girl she once saw in a dream. Then there was a creature, something lay over Mantus's blade in the illusion outside the crystal ball. What Was That, was the only remark Tula could think to herself.

The Eyes of the Fallen Captain, somehow among this magic she could no longer see?

Another exchange in the brief conversation was swiftly revealed, and a Yes Sir lingered past. Mantus prowled over the hill and shrugged with a supposedly good-intent to signal Tula's cue to escape, she went along with the peculiar plan. The flute dropped off the pirate's latch with ease, a discarded branch outlived it's usage.

Mantus did not notice what he left behind. Tula subverted the touch of his cunning strategy by wrapping the only method of thwarting her in silk instead of her bare hands, but what he may have been up to, she could not figure out. She retied her waistsash and prepared to flee. Jitata Brat In The Soundless Cave Better Still Be Afraid. Those unique words she swore by Kuunda she heard outloud, it suspended her into a cold standstill. "What did you say, Mantus?" Concealed demands spilled from the sorceress's silent lips before she could do otherwise. Tula froze.

"My debt has been repaid." Mantus did not turn to look, merely went about his business.

Tula looped around, she traced the commander deeper out into nowhere to keep watch. From a distance she scrutinized the cave he had chosen in a seemingly random devise. He scurried for the entrance after bobbing his head to and fro as if he expected something to pop out from the inside. She succeeded in stealing what was suspired from him, but something was not right about his information and she couldn't account for it. Every iota of intuition she boasted of herself was telling her to leave this ground and never return, but she was longing to see Ren. Her instincts were for the moment, strangled. She feared abandoning the possibility her comrade may be suffering, then she would be turning her back on him and risking his loss yet again. She would never do that.

"Eat up, jitata boy. I'm not going to be nice to you when Lord Bloth awakens." Mantus gnarled and kicked at something in his purview.

What was that? Mantus threw something in the jagged rocks, it looked to be tidbits of food, but Tula couldn't be sure. He was just standing there, swinging his able arm. If Bloth woke up, would he make Ren even more miserable? Mantus circled around to search for any activity in the brush, then trudged off without a trace.

Tula knew she should have run back to tell Ioz a long time ago, but now there was a possibility she could see Ren...she would just take a peek. She was able to steal the Ocarina from Mantus after all, and checking the cave for Ren would be no different than taking scrolls from Obrik's library. After that, she would leave, finally.

The channel led farther voluminous than Tula had imagined. Where her course continued, small barges floated above the silt ducts. The ecomancer's senses honed in on a loading dock and a moored boat with a cabin, gurgling squeals drew her timorous ears. "Ren...?" Tula actually felt chills of fright now. From the solitude generated by all-encasing barriers of stone choking the outside-world her weapon pierced viciously at a shadow apace and the vague sound of a man crying as she pulled her steady boots for the swaying cargo-hold. She didn't recognize his voice from the tortures he must have endured inside the abandoned slave-vessel. "I'm coming...Ren." She drew in a breath to ready herself and tiptoed close enough to her goal, there she waited. The haggard leg stretched out to the bend of her knees, roughly tripping her to the ground.

Tula ripped out her slicing edge but only to have it beaten off with a slick curvature of steel. The Ocarina was toppled to the dirt and a slimy hand scrabbled over her mouth, muffling her shrieks. Tula felt a nauseous illness overcoming her, as unexpected victory was transformed into due tragedy.

Ren wasn't in the cave, neither was Bloth. Only Mantus, and he had let her investigate the inside of the aperture while he lurked in queue behind her. Tula hadn't even sensed him, she was too engrossed in trying to feel for her friend. The instrument's cry was the most terrible sound she had ever heard before, a vortex opened out of chasmal clouds. All around her were visions of trees turning black and crumbling into dust in the most cyclonic blight powdering into smog from the pressing of his lips. Her attempts to punch at the pursuer resulted in travesty, he knocked her off her legs when he dragged her aboard.

"How stupid, woman, now the inn can wait! You make a poor replacement for a serving-wench, but you'll save me a fee at the door. I wonder if you know, or even remember how Bloth offered you my status as commander. It's not your lucky evening if you're expecting Traitor Ioz and your Son of Primus to save you." Tula's desperate eyes of green flared at a cloaked dagger the raider drew from out of the suffocating vortex. She tried to knee him in the stomach but she couldn't move. She could not lift her hand to chuck an ale-mug at the helm to swing it out of dynamic. Tula attempted to erect a shield of soil between her and Mantus, it failed. In a last-ditch-effort she attempted to embody the torch wielded in Mantus's hand to engulf him and scorch him to a crisp, it failed also. He set the flame into a nook as she collapsed on the platform and into a tortured mess.

Tula suffered the anguish of seeing her environment destroyed in glimpses of embers. "It hurts so much! Why you-you-the whistle-" The poor ecomancer could only rue this stupidity of allowing herself to be lured into a dooming capture at the barred door's click.

"I didn't forget how fine it must have been to have your reward paid upfront for that sideshow you pulled on the Maelstrom. Surely you enjoyed prancing in your cheap silks for my Captain, and if successful leaving me to the monstrous fate of Vunk for your risky prank. What is good for the captain is good for the commander when ignorant scraps like you shake your hips where they don't belong...so let's get this gala moving, eco-wench." The hazard had crept forward, any shard of mild intimidation was antithetically absent and replaced by a numb hostility. Mantus was true to action when he violently dumped the ocarina that was no longer necessary in his scheme.

"Let me go-you!" Tula cried to be sparred as her kick reached a loose pair of shackles on the ground. She tried to remove the venal images of a ravaged Mer from her heart. If the filching villain stalked any closer, she would be too weak to resist him. Dark Ecomancy took it's harrowing effect on her blood.

"I wonder what happens if an ecomancer permanently looses her energy...how painful this exploit must have been to the trouble you're already in. I steal more than gold and gems from higher-rated wenches than you, smool-brained sow..." The cruel snicker hovered over the pitiful groans and thrashing. "I'm sure this theft will be very exciting for one of us." Tula's eyes were swollen wide at Mantus's tactic, it took him but a blink of her lashes and a bruising blow of angry claws to pounce on her. When he subdued her he was handling the devastating melody once more, playing notes of disaster.

"Gold and gems is what this is over?! What if I paid you...to leave? You greedy-" Tula offered troublesomely against Mantus creeping over her shape by the lithe arm which wrestled her to deck-board. The tiniest notion of helplessness against Bloth made her skin crawl in shivers, and much rawer, because she would become hostage in his prison too soon.

"Pay me, aahah-haa-haa! Are you trying to make me laugh by your pathetic offering, eco-shrew? With this instrument, you see...I'll rob you of your abilities and have you out of my way without fault. I'll turn you into a common barmaid. Imagine what a worthless pest you would be to Ioz then, you'll no longer have your winning talent. You could be just another filthy woman for him to discard in port, just like all of his scum-maidens. Your boy might care, if only he wouldn't be locked away while the new Zuuror reigns until Mer's death. I can do anything I want to you when you are under this bind, like delivering you gift-wrapped and broken-in. It isn't much to disarm you, but it's a victory for Bloth...and I." Somewhere in Tula's locks a sinewy hand slapped her nose against the sunless floor, his evil laugh shook her out of defiance.

"I won't be Bloth's tool, just because you can stop me ecomantically doesn't mean you can avoid this-!" Tula summoned every splash of human energy within her to jut her knee at where she hoped she may have made contact for long enough to evade, but even her knees were affected by some alien attack to her strength.

"I'll take my risks. You will belong to Bloth shortly, but I wouldn't worry about him right now. Konk said stealing your ecomantic devotion would be like robbing a brat of a candy-clam and now it's my turn to enjoy the prize of your cracking bones. How sad your nature has lost to me, forever, and you will sleep in it...stung and broken by something of mine." The fine dagger was slanted at her hand and blouse, the distressed captive wheezed from a sensation of a blackened razor peeling on the bone's brim.

"I-don't know where the Ren is...so how can I tell anyone...W-what is this a-bout?! W-what do you want?" Tula wrangled to dodge Mantus as much as possible, finding it harder to breathe with what felt like an elbow on her chest. She winced, the point of the dagger was beginning to pierce the flesh inside her palm and was driving it's way to the ground. She didn't know what was going on, just wanted him off of her. In the past she had been told stories of the ways pirates often hurt or terrorized civilians when they raided. She couldn't imagine she was in for anything good.

"You, completely defenseless." Those burning eyes menaced like sharp ice, a set of effectively-spoiled incisors sprouted from a voice she could barely make out.

Tula's lids rolled over, her sight whittled in a fade to black. All she could sense disappeared from her, unaware and blinded by pulses of blurred emotion. Everything dissolved from her will except for the last aim to hear him grunting and snorting hazily, a flute's dying music from a hankering wrath made herald to his schemes for brutal supremacy over her in his mean heart. The demeaning of her spiritual powers was ultimately working her over from the damage she imagined, woozy fear forced her closer to the bliss of unconsciousness. One more gash surrendered Tula to nightmares.

It was a mistake, she should have never come out here...never ever tried.

Chance and ache burdened Tula to pass out but a boisterous snap of courage awoke her. "Chungo lungo!" Shouting out of the formidable forest was a brawny fighter. "Mantus, you creature!" Mantus wailed as Ioz charged with the vanquishing might of a steel army.

"Freeze, one-armed bandit!" Zoolie plowed for the miscreant, a furious scowl barricading the wayward commander's retreat. Niddler flew in with a slingshot-ready Solia.

"Three against one? I guess you can't best me in a fight one-on-one, so now I'll have my revenge for the damages you caused me with the fire which ruined my successful life as the richest Maelstrom sea-lord of Bloth's order. Now stand out of my way. That wench owes me for thinking she could upsurp my position to let me drown in the Constrictus's den, and when I get her leech-choked neck back under my sword I plan to show her who's in charge of this skin in my quarters...my victory on her will be bloodcurdlingly slow!" Mantus jaunted at the contenders, fluently disregarding any obstacles as he slashed on Ioz's saber. The pirates criss-crossed in a standoff as a revived Tula wobbled toward the resistance.

"It does not matter to me how badly you seek payback on Tula and I, Mantus. I may lose my legacy's fortune and my blade to the ground in this bloody pirates' war but I swear on Raymit's soul you will not cross my sword without first impaling your wasted guts on it." Ioz honorably patrolled the line between Tula's body and his own, Zoolie and Solia extracted their defending armaments on either side. Tula stood for the struggle behind Ioz in ruffled but tidy clothes.

"Are you sure you have the guts to back up that bravado yourself...Ioz, when you yourself crew with a woman...and let her win your victories for you? Is that souvenir eco-wench a kind of conquest to you?" Mantus spat with lattermost disgust, his snaking gaze slunk on the clever woman as if she were an icky whelp.

"Tula is more cutthroat than you ever were, and that's the way I like her. Using a woman to do my dirty work is like swallowing the very poisoned-ale you swig with your bottom-feeding lips. So, if you want your revenge on me then come here and claim it, eel-heart." With brunt Ioz clashed his blade with the detestable outlaw-of-the-sea. Tula stumbled and noticed she was free from the duress of Dark Ecomancy. Immediately the bright heroine summoned a slithering vine from the bramble floor, fettering and constricting Mantus about the midsection. The commander however took no time in cutting himself to freedom from the ties and dove for the corrupt whistle as Tula scrambled for safety.

"It's easy when the enemy thinks she is in charge." Tula gloomily fell to her knees, no longer capable of maintaining the stamina to continue. When she fainted her forehead fell by Ioz's galoshes, which restlessly bolted away. His swiping of an object was instantaneous.

"Zoolie!" Ioz called out for backup, the bar-fighter delivered Tula to another section of the battlezone. With a rapidly-raging heart Ioz pounded his weight over muddy water for the cruel deceiver. His massive shoulders wrest remorselessly toward the opposition. "You won't be needing this." He rapt his fist away at an resolution to permanently crunch the diabolical Ocarina that he had stolen in a pinch from the murk. Letting the fragments of oppression trickle to black dust, he advanced with clapping knuckles. Ioz skid Mantus around the bend of the beaten path. The sly cutthroat crawled sideways and loomed over a now backwinding Ioz. Bloth's dexterous assassin stabbed metal for the colliding monkeybird, lunging to scale a boulder bed on the turf and held to his overlooking base.

"When you let the enemy think he's in charge, it's easy, kreld-eater!" Out of the sedge Solia aimed and fired her sligshot, smacking Mantus off balance from underneath. The action sent the coldheart flowing straight in target of Ioz's strike. "Thanks for letting us show up early to your party, rat-head! Our gifts are way better than what Tula will give you, now I think my brother would like to crack something of yours!" She startled an unprepared Mantus with a fierce jab, leaving him at her brother's lack-of-mercy.

"You are vile. I see you haven't changed at all from the devil-leech I used to crew for. Allow me to put you out of your misery, for good!" Ioz swept out into a storming spate at a bony neck. His temporal fuse toward the second-in-command had forevermore vanished, like a swinging nightmare he confronted the miserable opportunist before a quarry of quicksand and retracted Mantus on the last arm to sleep in the same dust personally vanquished by strapping knuckles.

Without a spare instant to escape, Mantus leapt backward to the highest branch of an adjacent pine. Ioz disengaged from the bark pronto, his chopping cutlass missed severing the mark it had sailed to hit.

"Chippungo!" Ioz had never witnessed such a last-resort reflex in battle from his wretched foe, he recoiled his blade and Zoolie guarded and covered. Ioz had swung to kill, and his unsuccess was a miracle.

Mantus was truly afraid, but fear had instantly transformed into an unquenchable lust for vengeance. The beaten opponent was twisted with a swearing scowl, he pounced into the shadows.

"She's not harmed. Frightened though." Zoolie hurried to the torn ecomancer, he sat her up to rest by his knee.

"Thank Kuunda she's not, but I know who is going to be. I'll show that deadbeat to Bloth, with a golden noose...around his neck." Ioz patrolled the territory, watching for any wink of commotion. Zoolie concentrated on tightly wrapping her bruised palm, applying the bandage hampered the flow.

"I thought Ren was here...but I found Bloth's ship only because I followed Mantus...It's sickening!" Tula called out to the helmsman, who was now kneeling to nudge her to a rejuvenation.

"He hasn't found the Eel-blood poison. They're not gone for good, unfortunately." Ioz hefted the wounded warrioress up with his broad mantle, quietly raveled. He carried her around a snaking groove to a lower heap of ocean rubble.

"It was Ioz's idea to come after you. Predators don't clean up after prey very well." Zoolie invited his pal to collect a chary frame.

"Ioz, you chauvenistic sea-pig." Tula softly snarled as she unfolded her eyes, she lay exhausted from the fight of her life.

"I'm sorry, Tula. I didn't mean you weren't important to us. You could have been taken away or badly injured, this was my fault." Sincerity was never one of Ioz's strong suits, but he showed a remorseful tenderness to the scorned ally. He patiently smiled as she had subtly resumed her normal tenacity.

"Let's stay together please, Tula." Solia huddled near her tired friends, fortuitously vowing her oath.

"Where is Ren? We have to find him." Tula scrambled into a crucial vigor, careening on angle under Ioz's temporary comfort.

Ioz peered down at Tula, sustaining her evoked a heart's break. "Yes, Tula, we have to find Ren." He soothed his dolor. He let Tula walk on her own after her tension felt ordinarily better.

"I'm sensing extremely-destructive weather conditions, coming from the North." Fronting the effort, the eco-mage trekked toward a twister of red lightning over high-tide.

"Chungo-lungo, and the Eyes of the Fallen Captain! Someone's ship must have sunk or those clouds are playing tricks." Ioz shouted as a sprume of fog reduced Avagon's warships to the rapids.

"That isn't all, Ioz. If we're going to find Bloth, we'll want to deal with these first." Zoolie pointed to the ground that was rocking like the waves. The grass was purple. However, closer revealed not hedge, but a breed of wiggling vermin that was thickly displaced from where it should have resided. "Nightmare Eels. Back away!" He fronted the formation, hacking at the flocks nipping at his toe.

"Whatever you do, don't let them touch you!" By a hasty urge Ioz hurtled over infection-chewed logs in his way. Tula hand-in-hand fused what little lifebeams were possible at the plague, carving out an avenue. Considerable chungo-lungos and nearly-missed dives later, five heroes aspired to their destination through the purple mist.

"He's gone." Tula stared at the empty battleship as she slowly pad to a stop, a murmur cut at the futile seabank, monolithic Ruins of the Taikal swamps blockaded the road behind her. Bloth had abandoned ship.

"We want our Octopian wenches!" The clamor of a brutal hoard of Valjen murderers multiplied as the ruffians pounded their knuckles. Ripping chains and scythes spun overhead like backdrops to the bloodthirsty commander. Captain Shellga impatiently crossed brawn over her rocklike torso.

"Soon, very soon. I do have to keep my men happy." Big Shellga avowed with a hefty gabble, her delight keenly remarked by her lupine leer. Shellga was smaller than Bloth, but with a chest like a tree trunk and shoulders as wide as Mantus's head. The ferocious captain was a beast of a lady, her body closely resembled a man's and her muscles bulged out from her splitting bodice. On this day she was dissatisfied with the lack of coin to procure, having earned a mere drabul during the time she continued to travel with Bloth's goon.

"The easiest method of dealing with Bloth is to set Ren on fire, and watch it spread." Positive and covered by shady features, a destructive Mantus chortled while he dashed the way.

"So where is this Son of Primus you've been talking about? We don't have all day, goat-legs." Captain Shellga heaved her bust, trampling to challenge the outlander's claim in a threatening waddle of husky thighs.

"It's this way." Mantus's collected voice calmly summoned them to a fragile ridge. If he could leap over the moss turf to safety before the lumbering Valjen-mutts, he would have succeeded in trying to lead them off the Taikal-Star cliffs. Then all their jewelry and a piece of gold would be his, he wouldn't need to try any tricks with change owned by Bloth.

"Why are we listenin' to this Quin hack? Don't we hate them star-chewing guuda-bloods?" The equine-faced brutes rebelled persistently, arms were thrown up at the sheer lunacy of following the foreign ravager. Some shorter men and women who comprised the insatiable quintet were Mantus's size, but the best of them were at least one head higher than the tall Qui-Qua native.

"Yeah, didn't we ransack this pretty-prince's palace dry of feed and laugh all the while?" Another hale female in the troop consulted with two flunkies, making a mockery of carnage. "Tell Dishonorable-Daddy we'll give his countrymen work in the Ruukaana mines anyday, will you, Tukla Mantus?" Tyday pranked her scrawny victim by unsheathing the sword squeezed under her solid knuckles, and chuckled from her hide-breastplate to her three-toed pads at Mantus's defensive reaction.

"Sure did, Tyday! The whole sail home!" The Valjen raiders next to the sword-raising lass in the pack joined in the torment.

"Tukla Mantus, tell us where the Treasure is now or your beard-looping hide is gonna be swinging from the gallows after we cut those golden choppers outta yer mouth!" The rioting band rose up in a torrent of violence, an offended Mantus was volleyed with blades and blunt objects.

Mouth gaping from an angry dread, the mistreated tactician flogged legs as his partial-dangle over the canyon at the end of the cliff wall. "Hold it!" Mantus's snide grin returned as the Valjen leader halted his slide, Captain Shellga lugged him back by the raiment. "For a Quin man, he's not bad looking, very lean. I haven't wrangled me any foreign-fare since forever, and his hands...are very...Accommodating." Shellga invited his wriggling form to sturdy ground but was instant to slip an abrasive yoke around his neck, she lifted his chin to examine his bony anatomy. Mantus jerked his knee. "How would you like to belong to Big Shellga's crew, my Guuda-Hunk?" Shella sat uncompromisingly, straddling his waist. She had positioned him in such a way that he was forced to gaze above at the unsightly scar across her broad face. She smiled with sultry teeth.

"No!" Mantus panicked and wrenched. He gnarled and began to beat on her legs with his fist. Shellga struck him away.

"I want him on my terms, but if he is going to resist me, dump him." Big Shellga soon granted her hassle escape, only to rank him gone with the point to a cliff.

"Yes ma'am!" The vulpine crew toppled the three-limbed commander with a grand cheer. Mantus winced up at the faction through the broken stakes of the ravine surface, he limped his bedraggled self to a spiral staircase of stone.

"I can't stand insubordinates." Shellga glared as she set off beyond the Taikal-Star cliffs, directing her outlaws.

"Time to take out the rest of these Chungo-lungo's scout-ships." Each time Ioz cursed he took out another pirate. He advanced with his zigzagging hops over the rowboats lining one of the few clean inlets of Octopon. Shepherding the excursion he swayed onto a stable deck, Tula grasping the helm and debarking on a reflective basin on the sight of Avagon's drowning war-vessel. The whip of a ponytail lashed to a sprint as rugged boots deposited atop the leagues of the cornucopia. The young sorceress skittered to a landing in the tropical palm-field, two dagron pilots had debarked with her. One elder swordsman and a cloaked compatriot unmounted the twin reptiles.

"I lost track of Avagon!" Tula squeezed out. Niddler skedaddled to Tula's side.

"I'm here, brave ones." To the adventurers' shock, a surviving Avagon slid down from a steep tree nearby. "Bloth fled for the tunnels, Loren has orders to lead the fleets below." She statically imparted a finding. The others watched as she revealed an underground passageway shielded by a hulking door of grated steel, she caromed to the inside.

"Avagon!" Tula passionately screamed, running after her. "Come on, we have to go! He's going where Ren is!" Tula drastically urged to leave, but the others hesitated to move.

"Shouldn't we find out what's blocking Tula's powers? I thought destroying the Ocarina myself would cure her." Ioz suggested with dreadful burden.

"I'm more worried about the thing in the sky!" Niddler cawed, he tensely blinked eyes up at the circling source of distress on high.

"What the two of you speak of is one in the same." Phorlock began with a gentle wrinkle of his squat nose, offering insight. "I can be positively absolute the destructive aura is emanating from that beast. Unfortunately, there is not any time." He issued astute words as he beckoned his disguised gentlewoman to come forward to the gully's entryway. Tula did not appear pacified.

"Ioz, time to finish this!" Out from the jungle shouted an enraged metal-hybrid. Ioz's recognizing eyes anchored and swelled like a drifter in foglamps.

"You stay away from him! You'll pay for forcing us to defect!" With a scornful anger the apostle of Phorlock guarded. Protecting Ioz, she loosed a turquoise weapon upon jumping out from the side of a pallor reptile.

"There is no such thing as paralyzing mist! Leave me alone, Guuda-wench!" The barely-human scalawag bayed and hissed, flailing away with a clicking arm.

"Valjen scum-eel! Why you...!" Saytai charged to the lead with a scrappy and awful fury.

"Saytai, stop." Phorlock snagged the bejeweled dame's wrist toward him and escorted her into the well with a gesturing nod.

"If our Quin friends are going in with Avagon, maybe we should find another pathway." Zoolie calmly instructed for another tactic. He motioned to Ioz, who appeared unsure as well.

"Wait!" There was a voice that echoed from behind, eyes bent to stare.

"It's Jazhea!" Niddler informed a union, seeing the braided girl dismount from a dagron far away from where the heroes had gathered. She was running toward them. Avagon's soldiers were on land and pouring into the tunnels. To the fringe of the field, the young pilot surfaced to join the rest of the group.

The channels underneath the dabbled plane of Southern Octopon were filling with commotion. Thudding of footwear vibrated into the thin concrete walls, roars and wails of exertion could be distinguished. Conflict had already broken out.

"You may take that trail ahead, Bloth's men should follow us!" Avagon strategically advised, bearing away from the refugees and crossing around a mountainous pillar.

"Thank you, Avagon." Phorlock convivially bid regards. "Stay close, Saytai. It's been far too long since I have visited here." In a conscientious manner, he led the more susceptible of the vigilantes.

"Will we really find ky niok down here?" Saytai timorously questioned, clamping the arm of the senior chaperon.

"If Bloth is here, so will he be." Phorlock earnestly foretold. He slid around a bend and as he did, he heard a swoop and a yell. Then a clack.

"Yahil! They're here!" Saytai screamed from in back, she defended herself against a vicious enemy bandit with her weapon. The looter would have cuffed her to the ground. Another slicer repelled the opposite scythe.

"Be on guard!" Phorlock coolly signaled. Saytai quickly scattered out of range before Phorlock successfully laid waste to the rough grunt. They stepped over the passed-out guard and found themselves bordering an intersection. The Quin natives recoiled as an inclining tremor was felt, then whirled around. "There!" With an assertion he pointed to the bounding oaf, and the more-important trickster closeby.

"Well, well." The hulking origin turned about, seemingly amused as he chuckled at the wanderers.

"Surrender, Bloth! You won't destroy Ren, no matter how much you yearn to." Phorlock's regent tone pummeled through the dimness of the ornate passageway. Only a wasp's wing fluttered before the clash of fierce metal could be heard as he slammed arms with the Pirate Lord. The averse sword mauled and he leapt back, two more blades lay in queue upon the left arm and toe of the Master of Three Swords. The nefarious Captain rushed a nod at the lean accomplice.

"You don't matter anymore!" From the shadow of the beast, Mantus screeched with a livid animus. The lunging form scrapped the precise cutter at an awing Saytai, who could not evade in a fleeting instant.

"Not so, Syukn!" The protective ancestor forbid. Before Mantus's severing edge could meet the destination the stem of Phorlock's aggressive broadsword clanked in front, a second rapier he drew from the sole and third from the other palm. The entire trio wielded, he raced his ankles off the resistant wall to deliver a running shock of raw ability. The criminal's cutlass slipped out of palm with a single collision and shrieked along the stone path as it decelerated from it's master. "Only five years I was given of my own to live for myself before I became our Qui-Qua's Light, and I took her helm favorably for fifty more. So why is it that you were given fifteen years of life, and you failed everything you are? You may be powerful, but in your corroded heart you know nothing! You feel no compassion for the weak! Mantus, think a second time about your alliance. Who do you think is really responsible for the invasion of our homeland?" With supremacy Phorlock admonished at the glower of the collapsed officer on the floor.

"Who are you going to believe Mantus, me or this lying haggard and the detestable siren who tried to steal your rightful place and ruined you? Did she help you claim revenge on those Valjen-swine for that petrifying mist your coward of a father abandoned you over?" Bloth crooned a slick query as Mantus flayed a head between the interests. The commander scurried to the side to recover the evicted skiver.

"Don't listen to him!" Sayta cut in as she came forward to tear off her hood, energetically flustering to make herself heard. "Maybe we were attacked, repeatedly, by the Valjen. We all hate what they did, Mantus, but you didn't have to give up on us. Or on Qui-Qua! There's still hope!" With precarious verve she groveled with the dream of reconciliation. "This rivalry has existed for too long!" The proxy of Phorlock swore her valorous ambition by throwing down her own blade. The teal weapon chimed against the ready brace of the thief and then embedded into the borca-stone.

"What makes you think I will listen to you?" Mantus verged forward with a watchful inquest, his stance did not back down from the tiny woman.

"Because I'm the Zuuror and you were nothing, Mantus, until I said you could be something!" Phorlock again slid the sword out of Mantus's sluggish fist with a lithe tap of movement and tremendous rebuke.

"Because. The person you thought was trying to upstage you will give you what's rightfully yours. That is, if you live through this. Do you want your old life back? You want to be Zuuror, Tikla Mantus, and take Yahil's place? Leadership and responsibility are diffiult. Even to save yourself you didn't complete our tasks when we were young novices because you didn't respect me enough to share the charge, so now you'll have to start all over again. Yahil lost his influence when he didn't stand up to Valjen's trade threat, and now my people respect me over him or you. So now you'll have to listen to me as your overseer, it's the only way they'll trust you again. You have the chance to atone for your misdeeds, if you only go against Bloth! Bloth will never let you be imperial Zuuror of Qui-Qua! You'll just rule over...Nothing." The unarmed of the group pleaded at the side of the aged patriarch, who had bolstered a hand to her shoulder as she tried convincing the estranged relation. She ponderously awaited.

"You think I'm quite capable ruling over a dead nation and protecting myself at the cost of anyone's blood. Why don't you do what I fell short of, when you're done pretending to be the respected swords-Man, Quorzor with that disguise." Mantus scoffed, a near-shun of Saytai entirely.

"Listen to me, please! You're all that and more, if it weren't for you...do you know where I would be? You fought off three Valjen thieves who meant me harm. They were going to rob us. It was the year when I would become kindred with the Lord from Qui-Qua's Southern harbor of the Red-Eye tribe, and you came home from study. Yahil forbid me from walking alone, but you protected me. You were a skilled enough sire to do anything, even rule a kingdom, and you were loyal to your family and friends. Don't you remember...don't you remember who you really are? By Toiishok, God of the Polar Star, you're my little br-" For the first time, Saytai remembered everything she had been taught in fluent Merrian from her early days in class. She was sorrowed that Mantus had almost completely forgotten his home-dialect, except for the phrase written on that forsaken map.

Mantus stroked his sable beard to the threaded roots. Such a powerful honor on his home nation, Qui-Qua, to be the first of his status to attain it. Ever since the ripe age of fourteen, he trusted none and had done everything to avoid the consequences of manuihood that soon became a curse in his youth. Before he joined Bloth under mistakes of his past he had slain the mother of his only child for the accidental consequence of his killing of her witness brother. The machete-skilled Mantus silenced them both after the lad unluckily spotted him defending himself against a nineteen-year-old classmate who had earnestly attempted to slaughter Mantus out of jealousy of those whiskers that touched proper fulfillment at his scalp. For this crime, child Mantus would have been completely disbanded by his home nation, were it not for the inheritance left to him by his unwitting father, who had sent word home from Octopon that he was not only alive and well but had given crucial word to accompany King Primus on a marvelous Quest that was soon to be embarked on. For though he was respected, Mantus was grwn s an adult too quickly. The tragic happenstance of his Father's abandonment when he was sixteen (QY) tundrioac-years ascertained the boy would not inherit alone, but rather he needed to share. "I have a better offer now, Saytasi. Why settle for a land when I can dom all of Mer." Mantus stolidly responded.

"He's dead, and he doesn't even know the Truth. He'll never listen, even if it's the right thing to do. Not to a fe-" Saytai morbidly murmured. Shrinking away, she reclaimed her saber.

"We have to go back, sea-flora. Unfortunately. We can't be in Avagon's way. We have to let him go. Maybe he was with us, but he's with Bloth now." Phorlock mournfully hurried Saytai, grabbing her by the arm.

"I hope you find out the truth, dear Niok. Before it's too late." Saytai glanced at Mantus one last time, saying her peace before spinning away to disperse.

"You know I sent word home of the importance of my mission after the kutlack error to my younger heir, not my wisest. By the way, my Syukn. You can tell Bloth that Mizar knew nothing. You followed orders to the disappointing letter and I would never say otherwise. Toii prohibits me." Phorlock affirmatively stated before sprinting through the opposite tunnel and shooting the treasonist a withheld stare. The dual interlopers tore back into the passageway before being tangled by a cluster of frenzied pirates. The shorter defector screamed as she was taken, weapon wrestled from her.

Phorlock fought his final battle. He persevered for Saytai as Mantus stilled at a distance. Both watched as the only link between them was trampled underfoot. "Yahil!" Saytai's tears could be seen and noted, Mantus froze in the moment until his arm was carted off by a heavy hand.

Part 2

Infested

Somewhere between the ruins of Taikal and the suburbs of Octopon helix concaves sheltered the enormous port of El Scorpascia, a metropolis lost in mortal legends and curses. Moored barges heaved in mild shifting of the harbor lagoon. Sparkles from the immoral masses of gold and gemstones shone brighter than the summer sun of Mer. Straight-walled buildings fashioned from pearl and rubies gated a mountain of 999,999,999 drabuls, and a bight blacker than the deadliest hole. The Dark Dweller's heart in the center cast out every mirage of light from the glimmering temples.

"My commander is abhorrent but he is cunning, but you, Kauldron...your lies are only believed because you have grace and charm. How am I supposed to conquer if you are the only man of my crew who is trusted by Ioz, and you cannot even find out the secrets of that Sword or bring the Maelstrom to me sooner? Answer me, Genutani, or your fate will be the dark water as will be the remnant of Primus's Seven and Avagon!" The furious Bloth lost any shred of his temper at a sable-haired cohort, the twin-tails on the peak of Kauldron's mane frayed. The magician phased to the background of a scuffled Mantus snickering at his own plots.

"I am sorry, Lord Bloth, but you know I cannot grant my own wishes. The wish must be directly related to the person and they must trust me with their eyes, I cannot force their will. So too, I cannot ship out to sink when Ioz and Tula have not shipped in themselves. If you wish me to speed the course of the Maelstrom, I will need the necessary ingredients." Kauldron's natural limitations echoed with his serene magnetism.

"Very well, bones you want? Bones you'll get! Mantus!" Bloth crossed his arms, invoking the cohort from where a heap of flinching prisoners were gathered. "Bring me one of the worthless ones!" Without remorse he demanded. On skating heels Mantus cracked the whip in the blink of a sore lash. The tender slaves huddled to each other for security through sobs as the second-rank picked out a stout native by the wrist and lifted her.

"Drop your prickling arm, Mantus, or I'll aim otherwise." Mantus retracted as he was interrupted by the flight of a dragon-bolt zinging past, unfurling the hand from her sleeve.

"Speak of the Dark Dweller, the becalmed Eyes of the Fallen Captain are upon me and they have brought me what I need. Mantus, I trust you to give our Off-the-Wind friends a warm welcome, I have a royal fish to fry." Bloth trounced toward a mine-way, giving his fleeting instruction. Ioz failed to catch up, becoming barred by the hooked cutlass and blundering onto the rump. By misfortune the Wraith's navigator exchanged gazes with a tall confidant.

"I just needed one more word from Bloth's angle to gain your Tayhojian traitor's trust." The bragging commander gladly accosted a blazing entrepreneur and a determined rogue with his clever ploy. "Yes, Ioz. I ordered Kauldron to have you killed by the Krelikhan." Mantus incurred with smooth words as he crossed his arm. "Jargis. Kauldron. Take care of them." He pointed a demolishing signal at Ioz and Zoolie. Kauldron crouched in formation, sending a wooden boomerang to greet the visitors. Ioz skipped around the circling sickle.

"Of course, Mantus, Bloth will never win to Ren and Ren will lose to us! Once the Maelstrom is back then we'll be one-billion rich! We'll be taking that Sword and your monkeybird, wench!" Jargis and Slaggon cruised on a vigorous angle underneath wings of a radiant butterfly. The slaver's flying-chair was curbed entirely by Zoolie's knuckles before it mowed down Solia and her arms around a wrenching Niddler. Avian wings threshed high as they climbed far to the ceiling, Niddler abandoned his melee of talons but a duo of traders surpassed him.

"Ioz! Tula! I can't fly away, and the dark water will swallow me if I try to escape!" Supernatural snares overhead wound the croaky monkeybird's feathers. The central core girdled him so only the tricky charmer who immovably posed at the jagged borderline could grant Niddler flight.

"Ah, Zoolie and Ioz. Thank you for revealing to me your secrets, tipsy pirates. Your only brewer is here, and I hope our conversation at Loor was everything you wished for." Kauldron's eyes flared a pearly white, he crackled with a slicing laugh.

"Did he get us shipwrecked three sheets to the wind...you know, hung-off-the-starboard...with his eyes?" Though comprehension of such a fantastic lunacy was not something Ioz easily understood, Zoolie stared at him with an odd reflection and reluctantly nodded. "So you're the cheater who is helping that Chungo-lungo. Now fight like a warrior, kreld-eating sea-slime!" Ioz plowed with a blustering tempest at Kauldron, cracking the cutting edge of his weapon.

"Slow down, Ioz, you didn't give me the opportunity to properly tell you my place. I did summon the Krelikhan to dispose of you and Zoolie when you were still Bloth's pirates as Commander Mantus says, but I also wrecked your cargo-boating family in the Floating Coral Reef and lured your sweet girlfriend Taneuka's ship to the Maelstrom when you were a fifteen-year-old stripling. I remember how you valiantly joined us so she could be free...I've lied and told truths but as I've honestly said before, though my disloyalty to you may not matter...I'm looking for my wife." Kauldron slunk backward on shifty shoes, his toes gently dashing above the ground on the signal of his lips. He caught the small boomerang, neatly folding it to the pit of a pocket for later wielding. Time passed as a joke, the snap of his fingers roused a jumbo pyre that flooded between each contender.

"He's a Genutani, they grant wishes with the nerves where their powers are. Kauldron has the wellspring in his eyes! That illusion, it's the same fire spirit I saw in the forest! Except very real..." Tula matched spellbinding glances with the swirling Fire Entity as it dazzled beyond, with a simmer in her might she conjured a burst of water at the element. Unluckily distant of her earlier encounter, this scorch did not fade away.

"I don't care if you were honest about working for this smilge because of your jitatan ship-wife, then spit it out and go find her! I don't have time for games, mug-craven lunatic. Your buddies have stolen someone who is my captain and deck-brother. Bloth destroyed my old-man, and his berth-mate almost tore his ghastly claws at both my sisters. That is the one from home, and the girl in my seafaring-heart. Now move aside before I dunk you in that black puddle for a bath, forever." Like a tiger ready for war Ioz drove the sharp point of his blade at Kauldron in a defying spite, he shouldered the bronze robes and sable hair from the pedestal. Kauldron materialized behind the misfit explorer, surfacing with his illusion.

"I appreciate your sentimentality but that isn't very kind of you to forcefully move me." Kauldron clicked the tips of his fingers, raining down a boom of electricity that shocked Ioz. The victimized pirate screamed in terror and the nonchalant grin extended below a pair of snaking pupils. "I am Kauldron Jusikarot, Genutani, and the Sorcerer of illusions and hoaxes. For I practice a different kind of power unlike your ecomancer friend, brave adventurer. I can make your darkest nightmares appear before you for all of Mer to see, Mirages from Memories are my middle name. I am versed in Dark Ecomancy and every form of Merrian Magicks one can imagine. I only wanted to confide in you a little secret today...your Ren is beyond the realm of El Scorpascia but only the Chosen Two may possess the Treasure of Rule within Ren or any Treasure of Rule, I am their protectors and I guard their rightful place to have it. None shall pass!" Kauldron cackled from a glimmer of his wrists. Flowing his arms into a vertical stance, he wrought red lightning down on Ioz as his irises flashed.

"You were one of King Primus's Seven Captains, and he trusted you! How dare you do this!" Tula concentrated her will at Kauldron but she could not pin his placement, Jargis struck at her with a viper-spear. Solia high-tailed with her before Slaggon's energy-leech could hit.

"I will only allow Supreme Ecomancer Sugii and the Chosen Daughter to claim the Treasure Ren carries. I will protect their right to the Treasures of Rule at all costs. All who try to claim him in their names will perish." Kauldron pranced into the skyline with a rumble of savage dedication, expelling a dark ecomancer's beam from the palm of his hand. Ioz dodged but the force behind the blow singed the arm. Skin on the bones began to wilt excessively, evaporating the blood from the swashbuckling hero's youth as it would soon be dying. Dynamic explosions of scarlet swallowed the underground city of gold with dregs so that even Jargis constrained from moving any further into Kauldron's domination of the battlezone. Mantus laughed as he patrolled the spooked slaves.

"The Dark Dweller will take my soul when I give up on Ren or Tula." Ioz staggered to his feet as his hardened arm swung the sword hanging loosely down from one side, one eye closed at a dry wince.

"Then you will appreciate a taste of dark water!" Kauldron's eyes spun like a berserk tornado, heavy vocal-cords shedding like ransacking hellions in midnight onslaught as many slaves were pulled through his vortex of the lightless heavens.

Figures of an Ioz long ago developed high over the evil city of El Scorpascia. "Ioz, my boy, remember your strong heart when I cannot be. Bloth, you won't find the Ruukaana under Tayhoj you seek to forge a tracker for the Treasures of Rule before your time span runs out because the Valjen merchant you slaughtered told you wrong, so he could mislead you to destroy our island in his property's sake. What you seek is the mystical Compass of Rule sought by King Primus, his faded memory knows nothing of what to tell you. Only my brother, the Spiritual Attendant of Tayhoj was told by the King where it is, and good luck finding him because soon as I have said these words he has taken his own life!" Seen to all was his heaving father, Raymit, being inhumanly pounded into the deck on a carcass ship.

This is what you never said. Your father gave his life for the Quest and Alomar's Attendant of the Compass...and you...but did you know, Ioz? Tula grieved in her entanglement, sympathetically seeing him with a harrowed life chopped to bits that never his freedom-loving heart would allow him to endure. Warped fibers mummified over Ioz's flailing corpse, snuffing in Kauldron's drawing of his source energy from the dark water as a medium. Unexpectedly, he stopped. Zoolie tripped the wizard.

Crimson flickers crackled on Zoolie, pelting him to the edge of the hungry sludge. "Zoolie! Chungo lungo! Why you evil...my skin is melting away..." Ioz yanked his legs to the flat ground to stand on, threatening the indestructible Kauldron with a creaking dragonbow. "Tula...remember one thing, I-I lo-" His murmuring soul leaked from his flesh as his strength phased out, his purple fingers iced.

"Ioz, hold on! I think I can heal you, if I don't touch you!" In all her soul Tula wished to revive her friend and protector in all her care and love, she wasn't aware of how much nature's grace saved her world but in that moment she began to be again. Some hole of emptiness was shown glorious light, and she now believed in miracles.

"The bet is off, Kauldron." The coughing Ioz dusted himself off from the twinkling floor littered with odious greed as he made his triumphing dart into the prodigy's beige ankle. He waggled through what he supposed would be golden sand and suspended the string of the dragonbow's launcher, preparing for Kauldron's last victory.

"If you wish to heal him then you will suffer, unworthy ecomancer." The evil magician startlingly finished the job on another, a deep laugh reverberated with a chaotic typhoon of red lightning. Dark ecomancy muffled the emerald-eyed warrioress's cries, a suffocating claw of voided ocean entrenched her middle and choked out her lungs. Though Ioz may have stormed like a constrictusii's worst phantasm, not even he could stop the electric shards from reaching him before any chemical spell prevented Tula from falling apart.

"I'll bet Tula misses the job I left unfinished on her, but she won't be able to withstand it when Lord Bloth has her crawling very limp." Mantus unemotionally ogled at the spectacle as he sniffed the crisp air of wealth to exchange, but his immersion deflected to a slithering shadow.

Solia crept in back of a supervising Mantus and while she strangled him by the throat, her dangerous pursuit resulted in defeat. Before Ioz turned around to witness the grungy strategist grappling with her, a clatter bellowed from a hall of fortune.

"Mizzen-Conquest! Give up it, now! The words in of Reotozz the Brilliant, Prepare to be Starfished! Mantus of Qui-Qua...!" The surprise emergence shrilled from the opening of the domain, for the last day she would ever see she found the strength to lift the barrel. The plaited lass showed up, covered in war-paint and clad with a trembling starzooka pointed at the infernal bandit. In retaliation Mantus briefly injected a poison to the sickly insides of a hand-held flesh-eater. With all the furor of a she-wolf Solia tackled her attacker to the gilded ground and onto the deck of the ported Wave. With only arms to bear her weight, a braided freak slipped into the pile-up. Glimpses of every shoddy contender and a few pulses of ivory spun in kicks of a clash. The slugging persisted endlessly as the fighting clump exploded with more men and slaves. Only the Commander of the vessel noticed Jazhea, at the busting of her best arm and beating taken to her chest.

Mantus partially stabbed the lethal vessel with the butt of his sword, the vermin tore ears with crying as purple blood coated the metal. "In this squirming display of life is the very essence of permanently loosing all innards wherever stricken by, contained in a toxin-launcher. The larva inside the blood-plasma will swallow air, thus leaving the victim in a constant state of drowning in just one injection activated by a little water. When possessed by such a controlling abscess there is no need for this Commander to force an end to all desires for the antidote through a single order, but what if those slaves aware of their betrayal don't want it? Thirsty flesh mauled by Eel-Blood is much better peeled in my way." Mantus viciously sizzled with a gruff and brutal menace.

"Z.M.Q.! Get me quck from!" Jazhea frighteningly ran away on the pitiful crutches bound to her elbows.

"Every sailor knows you never stare directly into the black dust of the Taikal swamps. Jazhea was stricken in her eyes, what do you think she did when she tried to escape Octopon's Day of Fire? How do you think she obtained her dagron-prowess, by normal reactions? Want something to drink, Primus's Daughter?" He hissed as he set the dire rim of steel beneath a polish of lasting warning, three more swerved their heads.

"The power! The dark water has become one with me to vanquish my enemies! One thousand and fourscore years by the black sun of Miragon's finest ruin it was predicted and now I have awaited this moment, those who oppose me will burn with the rotting tropics! The Treasures of Rule will be in my almighty hands for my wife and my Vivi!" Kauldron veins flooded as impulses of the power-hungry Dark Water lifted up the howls of a shadow in the underworld, his raving vehemence only served to accelerate as the metropolis started to shake with intensity. Drowning memories of Tula were transformed to floating pictures over her sinking body.

"Vivi? Someone from home once said...I was looking in the wrong place the whole time, but father once said...he would never let anything happen to his Vivi!" Tula screamed in the midst of something buried inside, a memory gripped her sense from the childlike position forced on her by the anti-nature binds. Kauldron's magic eyes yielded, black as a drainpipe.

The holograph danced in the stale dome inside the sealed temples, and it was all of her. Kauldron watched himself passing a baby girl, his own daughter, to a native Andorian. Those two were his partner's choice for a mother and father but unlike his wife, they were not ecomancers. The dark cyclone dispersed in a crackle with the single swipe of his wrist, a shattered ecomancer dropped to the freezing matte. Kauldron fell to his knees instantaneously and cried his tears that dribbled on the smooth tops of his hands.

"I'm sorry I hurt you!" The Dark Ecomancer broke like something out of marooner's play. Bleak and lifeless eyes that once brimmed with magic loomed down with shame at the wounded Tula until Ioz expelled him with an unquenchable rage behind a defensive sword. When Kauldron was forced to his feet he ran like the guilt waited to devour his stomach and destroy his head's dwelling. Unsuccessful at stroking a single hair on Tula's head, his wrathful glare sulked at the all-knowing tactician at the right-side of the hideous Captain, who had ducked out of all the bloodshed. He dashed as far from Mantus as his leaden legs would go.

"You better run." The jewelry-keeper's nasty snarl chased the legless dame fast through the curling streets, apt on slaughtering from a scarily-exact leap.

Kauldron lurched back at a shriek, his neck cracked and yawed suddenly. "No! You steal won't my bones again!" The blind Jazhea was being threatened by Eel-blood, nowhere to flee. The sorcerer closed his eyes, and they calmly flickered open.

"You'll bring the Maelstrom to port a lot faster with those bony arms, Lady Luck, and may just even keep Bloth from digging for clews. Now, make it easy like last time." Mantus taunted his hunt, a lame noble clawed for a dagron too far from her grasp. He twirled a steaming look at the remains of a spikefish clipped on his belt and scowled Jazhea into giving in to his control, settling her at his maneuver by the wrist.

"Jazhea, I have something for you to see!" Kauldron had returned so that he was fully confronting Mantus, invoking a deft call of alignment between her sunken eyes and his. He stared directly at peacock irises and she anticipated his divine gaze. Jazhea was put out of her misery in a puff of bittersweet vapor before the ingredients could be reaped. Mantus groaned with umbrage when the glittering pupils hailed about. "I don't play by the rules." The wish-casting villain scorned.

"Neither do we!" The artful plunderer hauled off and slashed on the distrustful vigilante at the only hope of his ship coming-back-in being decimated with those charming eyes. Kauldron swapped the sword short from his own forearm and decisively pointed his boomerang. Upon releasing the skimming board he galloped for a friendly tavernmaster with all his tenacity and speed.

"I'm ending this Quest right now. Zoolie, make your wish in accordance with Ren's will for the Treasures of Rule. Look into my eyes, and trust me." Kauldron contested a will like solid stone, bidding the barkeeper to make a drastic choice. Mantus and Kauldron bludgeoned each other but instead of staying and fighting, the Genutani hastened to the defense. Zoolie glanced between Mantus and Kauldron twice before he set himself on the evil magician. "I played a part in your betrayal and convinced Ioz the Eel-blood was of no consequence because I couldn't even hear Ren's name or else I would be forced to report it to Bloth's legion, there was a tracker on me! Before the Dark Water backfires on me you must know of the memorat's secret, the scroll-!" Kauldron staggered his revealing words but before he could even close his telling mouth, a morbid slice silenced the wishmaker. He was in a state of chronic animation. Mantus had wounded him but because the infected darva-worm was skewered by the blade, the juice pulsed into Kauldron's injured arm.

Kauldron collapsed on the slab as his eyes bulged, his arms were swelling and in a ceaseless spasm. He vomited the spawn of violet parasites as they bloated like impenetrable stalks blistered with acidic barbs, but the rhythmic laughing would not end. The beastly heaves continued until his flesh reddened from all around, but he did not faint. Slowly he rocked his body and dug starving fingers into flesh of burgundy welts, but the nails could not reach the central of his chest that his blood was begging to gratingly incise. The lips of Kauldron's ears and nose glossed in pink film, and did not cease his air.

"Who else wants to suffer?" Mantus stalked to the front of Kauldron's braying ligaments as they twitched from expulsion, he frisked a purple razor with something of a sick joy as the venomous plasma agonizingly drained out of the howling animal on the tip of sullied steel.

"I do." Zoolie stepped forward, Ioz and Solia revolted at this decision. Niddler chattered sonorously.

"Knowledge and power of men in battle...shouldn't be used by impoverished slugs who bear nothing more than chump-change." Mantus circled in a calculated focus on the courageous enemy. Remnants of Kaldron's claret sparks burst beyond the outskirts of the Dark Dweller's puddle where Tula and a supporting Ioz lay. Each of the fierce rivals bit before striking out the other.

"Then it should be used by me." Zoolie quelled the quiet brute by a jolly mumble, again wired to fight. The offending knife would have speared his belly if not for Solia's interference of a hurl of jetsam from the disastrous pirates's prisoners. Mantus's cutlass swooped for Zoolie but in that crucial moment fell to slit the fabric of his own barren sleeve, narrowly granting the crook another chance.

"I'll have what I want, and it's mine." Like a scavenging rat the bladesmaster scurried from the dust of his defeat and pick-pocketed his gold from Zoolie. Jargis took Mantus out of the archway and into the blind frontiers.

"There's no way to cure him!" Ioz aimed his dragonbow and as he allied the launcher to pierce Kauldron's heart, he boldened his iron emotions only for what was right and merciful. The misled victim shuddered as a rippling splash when the bolt plunged into to his palm, but it was eaten away by the webbing skin. Kauldron stared into his eyes inside the black and as the dark water swallowed him whole in a pitiless deconstruction of his limbs, his own wish was granted.

"He would rather be ripped to pieces by dark water than stand the nightmare any longer." Tula conceded to Kauldron's despairingly atrocious end, feeling him become nothing more in a haunting view.

"Ioz, take me with you! I don't have long, Kauldron hid me from Mantus and extended my life but only until my eyes go completely blind. My wish was to die...but I have something to tell Ren!" The questmates gawked on a stunning specter of Jazhea, her voice restored but was broken like her dissolved legs. She was hollow like a ghost, but alive.

"We have to find Ren now, and before Mantus gets a hold of any more Eel Blood or Mortal Blood." From his impulses Ioz dashed out of action and hesitation on a wit, conducting the scattered supplies and scouting for anyone unaccounted for. He cut Niddler's simian thighs down from plain ropes in the last deed before he moved on, binding magic no longer holding sway.

Deep in a chamber blotted of light, a blond man's heart froze as a door busted open in the most violent slam he heard. There was little time to prepare for the calamity when two more men came forth, one of them stomped toward him in a rage that could be only described as that of a monster.

"You're in trouble, boy!" The roar in Ren's ears was so loud that he was almost blown away. The eyes of the wan captive flashed with awe. Ren was wondering what he deserved this time, he badly wanted to know what was going on outside.

"Sir, we could use him as a hostage to get the Treasure of Rule back! Or should we melt every bone in his body?" Mantus's cunning and promptly urgent words at least gave Ren a hint. Bloth growled in a furious madness, clutching Ren by the throat so much it could be felt. "Or, perhaps some concentrated Dartha-Nightmare-Eel venom will get him talking. Joat's common Dartha fails to the real deal from Taikal." The strategist crowed. "Surely there's no reason to make him suffer vividly or go completely mad. When he's under it's duress, he'll have to reveal something to us. Since we can easily make him destroy anyone, he won't discriminate his friends from his enemies. He'll beg us for the antidote purely to end the fear of what will happen next. Just one injection is all it takes..." He added to the situation his bloodcurdling dispassion, extracting a dangerous dart enclosed from the utility belt and showing the desperately frightened Ren a glower.

"No! That stupid old woman and her armada! She knows!" The Pirate Lord sounded as if he was having an enraged tantrum, and he mostly was. "They won't find us here as long as they don't know about the ulterior passageway!" He roared cumbersomely, but his hysterics projected at the man behind him whittled. He focused a scary eye upon the prince. "Ren! I tire of playing games! If you do not tell me all you know about the Treasures of Rule then I will destroy you, and your friends! That is a promise!" He raved as he threw the young adventurer's head against the wall. Ren yowled when he bumped the shackling stone.

"I'll never give in!" Ren hissed with the most extreme vitality he could have in his placement, swinging his legs in a dexterous kick from the wall. He hit, but too gently. "Interrogate someone who can tell you bilge, Bloth. I don't know any more than you do and even if I did, I'll never...kreld-eater." Ren weakly choked, focusing on the enemy with defiant eyes. The enormous bully savagely screamed again.

Mantus smiled wickedly. "If you wish to kill him, Lord Bloth, why don't we use...Strain Two?" There was a cruel ploy flaying over the swordsman's tongue. Ren fearfully shivered.

"Where?!" The provoked Captain roared. "That hag has us cut off!" He contorted with an outburst.

"That may be true, but we still have this." The vile commander hissed as he lifted up the dark-water pistol that had been left in the room previously. It was infused with a different substance this time, one which did not glow. Ren recognized the case as the same however, which would mean a Drop of Darkness could still be floating in the mix.

Bloth's temper quelled and he inspected the discharger he wielded for security. He took out the 13th Treasure of Rule he toted with him and tarried to ponder as Mantus laid his hand upon the magic crown of salvation. "That's a good enough plan but how can we be sure it will work? When we damage the brat it may take to one of us and it will backfire if we simply fling the King's crown into the skies!" Bloth barked with irritation. "Even if we use the 13th Treasure to divide the River of Toishuok, how can we be sure the power within him will distribute evenly between us?" He disputed sensibly.

Mantus snickered shoddily. "Not if we make him drink it, Bloth!" The slithering and coldly calm gale of the master swordsman proposed, he batted a chilling glimpse at the now terrified Ren. "It's simple, we make Ren swallow half of the liquefied Treasure and distribute the remaining Drop between ourselves. If the River of Toishok is within him and we have the 13th Treasure of Rule from the North Pole, then wouldn't a Drop of the magnetic force from the Treasure found from the same location be able to draw it out." Mantus's logic lit up the evil Pirate Lord's ears and he passed a creepy smile to his second-in-command. In the moment of distraction, Mantus slipped Bloth's keys to the prisoncell off of the expansive belt and he obediently handed the revolver to his employer.

"Wait!" Ren outcried, and the thugs pivoted to face him. "I give up! I'll tell you how to use it!" Ren mightily shouted. Awful as it would be, he would have to tell them something, anything. If only to buy more time.

"You should have spoken up before you were cornered, boy!" Bloth howled with a devious revelry. "Do your worst, Mantus." The unethical ruler vengefully chuckled.

"No!" Ren screamed in daunt. "Bloth, you don't understand! Mantus lies-there's dar-" Ren's warning of the trap was quickly muffled by a palm of four claws muzzling his mouth.

"Mantus, you may have just come up with the best plan yet!" Bloth cackled as he then rolled a deathly eye on Ren. "We'll pour it down his sorry Octopian throat!" His cold glare focused on the noisy prince, who now clamped a mouth shut. Ren's wide vision petrified when the enemy squeezed his maw so hard that it could have brought water to his eyes.

"My blade will loosen his jaw!" Mantus maliciously snarled as he drew a shinning blade and approached Ren from the side with a twiggy wrap on the band of gold Treasure.

Ren struggled with a valiant imperative, he wailed in himself. It could not end this way, the dark water would do horrible things to him if it managed to succeed. He clamped his jaw closed, fighting against the foe's grip. He wanted to be out of here, somewhere far away. His only hope was on the outside now, and he was not sure how long he had been down here. No one had found him at all. Sorrow and dread consumed him, he would do anything to escape.

"Son of Primus, do you know what the price of mercy at my hands is?" Mantus egotistically bantered, Ren stilled. "Only the pay of every man on the Maelstrom." He jeered selfishly.

Bloth zestfully laughed. "Which unfortunately is rather, low, today." The implacable lord rumbled.

On the strip of land near a lighthouse, several of the seekers were gathered around the entrance to the abysmal canals underground.

"He has to slice the poison into a vessel first before he can coat it on his blade as a weapon. If you touch a sweat-bead of it you get the infestation." Ioz trot about the ledge, delving for a sign.

"You think he's in the tunnels?!" Jazhea riskily asked. Having just arrived, she saw all the teammates bunched at the square-shaped dwelling.

"Avagon went in." Tula issued word in severity, she had been holding onto the Sword of Primus to keep it safe. Jazhea nodded in response as she scurried to climb down first, until something struck Tula. "No!" Tula suddenly shrieked aloud. The others dashed sight at her in concern.

"What's the matter, Tula?" Ioz instituted with worry. Jazhea pulled back up any distance she had previously plummeted down.

"I sense Ren, Ioz! He's in danger, bad danger! We have to get to him now! It's bad, very bad! Worse than ever before!" Tula's green eyes showed absolute terror and heartache, hollow and lifeless as she wailed within earshot. Ioz bulged a glance at the the surrounding allies and Zoolie, who simply shrugged in bewilderment. He had never seen her look the way she did the entire time he knew her. Her panic was instantly transferred to him.

"Ok, let's go! Where?!" Ioz supported Tula by her shoulders and gazed into her eyes with his own black discs, demanding details with relevance and alarm. Tula slowly pointed to a course, North of where they were. "Tula, that's not very descriptive!" He impatiently urged, conspicuously upset.

"It's North!" Tula compellingly rallied. "Beyond Octopon, we need to go, now!" The ecomancer desperately screamed as if some invisible demon were attacking her. Whatever Tula felt from Ren, it must have been very bad.

"We'll need directions!" The considerate pirate hollered out, trying to pry anything else that may help.

"Wait." Jazhea starkly voiced. "I think I know the location where he might be keeping Ren." She somberly revealed. "The Palace of Scholars...it's where-" The golden woman started to explain, but was heedlessly cut off by an unhinged Ioz.

"Chunga lunga don't worry about that, just take us there!" The spooked swashbuckler instantly dictated, and Jazhea nodded. Ioz carried the stricken diviner on board, the group flew off on dagron-back. The ghostly princess learned a simple lesson, she didn't need legs to ride a dagron but she just needed fortitude.

"Kauldron...couldn't he have survived the Thumbbites, or Eel-blood. If he had only wished to save himself...?" Only when the dagron took off did Tula compulsively ask, after she had come-to.

Jazhea jolted Tula an uneasy glance. "Not when you belong to the coldest-pirate under the two moons, Bloth's assasin, Mantus. Here, Tula. It looks good on you." Jazhea cautiously smiled, placing her own jade pendant around the ecomancer's neck. She ignored the question entirely. Niddler and Ioz swooped at the side.

"Some invention of Bloth's main naja-dog, I only know what it does." Zoolie rather grimly answered back. "We won't be going to Dark Abyss, princess, we have many moons ahead of us!" He chuckled as he rubbed his forehead. Jazhea unwillingly nodded.

"Something you never want to see done, Tula. Ever. It's a motivator, then it's nothing. The most terrible nothing ever to be seen." Ioz harshly forbid, skirting from the lateral.

"Sport. New recruits for...anything valuable. You mean the captured crews, willing, throw their own overboard...otherwise Bloth will threaten them with dagrons. Janda-town, is an upscale ceremony of raiders. Isn't it? Fish catch Dagrons...and fly for Mantus!" Tula choked on a malodorous revelation.

"Yes, Tula. I wasn't, I volunteered for the task of being a Dagron-crew. Uyel would have been the sacrifice, and Taneuka likes him a lot. Also, you have that reversed." Ioz enlightened Tula in a perturbing truth.

"Reversed?! Then that means...no! No!" Tula was flabbergasted and horrified, then she burned like lava flowing from a cave of cindersand.

"Enjoying the truth now, Tula?" On the way to his destination, Ioz imagined he witnessed a familiar dark disciple, flying a way to the sands of Octopon and walking on a wave of inky shroud. In the cloudy bleak, he spotted a stygian demon encircling. "Noy jitat." The swear would be the only thing he could helplessly lip before his entourage and Jazhea's benevolent beast scoured off into the limitless boundaries.

"Hey, don't just leave me out of this! I think Say and Phor need some help! Where are they again?" Solia impetuously fled to the convergence of Saytai and Phorlock. "Noy jitata! Let me go-!" She hissed and bit as she was then silenced, her shoulders locked within the muscle of a hefty hijacker.

The dank room rebounded with the sounds of a struggle, a brave man was falling weaker in his attempts to ward off an attacking enemy.

"No way out of this, Son of Primus, no way at all." Bloth laughed ruthlessly. "What's the matter? Don't you want to join all the people you've fought so hard to protect?" The cruel sea-monarch mocked. "Eh, Prince Ren of the Dark Water?" Bloth remorselessly taunted as Ren attempted to prevent from swallowing the murderous darkness under the unyielding grapple, almost not succeeding. "Getting tired are we? Once I have you out of my way then I can use this Treasure to make sure the dark water never comes near me again, that's all that really matters!" Bloth's noxious and victorious spiel continued, he had let go of the enlarged circlet and was trailing to his waist for something jangling.

Ren would not allow him to do this. He tried in vain to pull himself away, but his movements were limited. He would not open his mouth or his eyes, they were fixed in place. He could not let himself fail, not for Tula or Ioz. Jenna and Niddler. Not for anyone. He kicked with all his might, but his power had started to diminish. He felt himself fatigue. This could not have been happening.

"Just give up, Son of Primus. I've already won. I'll destroy you And your homeland just as I have all the rest." Bloth promised coolly as the restrained Ren continued to tussle and fight with everything possible, which was not a lot left.

Mantus's eyes shot open as a perception struck his mind, lowering his arm. "Wait, Bloth!" The bladesman shouted to the hulking identity, his master rounded to him with a growl. Ren collected the opportunity to take a long and drawn-out breath, his heart pounded as his skylit gaze remained in a shocked state.

"What is it, Mantus?" The reprobate plunderer debated as he oddly scanned about the commander. It was not like Mantus to interrupt his own plots.

"I would like to make a request, Sir." Mantus besought with a curious inflection. It caused the villainous boss to raise a brow.

"Well?" Bloth transposed to him in question. "What is it?" His hissing conjure permitted Mantus to talk. Ren's frightened blue eyes zipped to the swordsman.

Mantus slyly grinned. "I made a bet with Konk that I could beat this sorry son of a larva-maggot to a pulp in a one-on-one fight! I'd like to see how much the gantha-pig will owe me once I finish the worthless boy. The added bonus, by then he will be too drained to resist his fate." Mantus cleverly snickered, he poked the tip of his sharp slicer at Ren. He handed back the Treasure to Bloth in full while he assumed an eager stance.

Bloth pondered this for a moment, perhaps he was in the mood for some entertainment. He still possessed full control over the situation, of course. "That's an interesting proposition, Mantus. I like that." Bloth smirked and amused himself with a chuckle. "Very well, we'll give our prince a little...fleeting moment of freedom." His sinister voice flayed as he arced to whisper to the racking Ren. "Don't get too hopeful, Ren. You won't be able to escape." The chilling croak could send creeps down Ren's spine. Ren suddenly found himself with the two around him, freeing shackled and sore arms. The flaxen-haired prince only obtained less than a pause to duck as Mantus's blade simultaneously came whirling at him.

"I'll bet he can't even run now!" Mantus provoked wildly as he again swooped his glittering blade at the unbound prince. Ren mustered the strength to somersault out of the way, just in time. The sword hit the wall.

Ren tried to think of a plan out of this jam. Though, he could not think very well while trying to dodge the commander's assault. He was unarmed, no way to defend himself. Bloth's astronomic form was stowed with a back against the door, the Treasure tucked under the belt and the Compass around the neck. He did not know where the keys to the cell were after he saw Mantus take them, but that did not matter because Bloth would not move. Mantus would not be able to kill but he could very well drain energy and then when beaten enough, his nemesis would try to make him swallow the liquid darkness again. Such a thing he apparently desired to happen now. Ren was almost certainly done for. Mantus's blade flew once more. Ren crouched this time and sent a punch to the stomach of frail fiend from the floor, which caused Mantus to yell out.

"Getting the fight knocked out of us already, are we, Mantus?" Bloth's humored comment directed from the door.

"That was a lucky shot! I'll slit this jitatan slug!" The lank plunderer growled and arranged to bring his cutter down on Ren, which in that moment, contacted the hero's arm and plunged him to the floor. Ren was not hurt, but vulnerable. Ren heard both his enemies laugh, Mantus stood over him, just scorning his fragile state. "Come on, Son of Primus. I thought you would be a tougher wager than this, slime." The haggard sailor of steel overhead regarded Ren with some combination of a jeer and an irritated scoff.

Ren rushed to get up and move but he quickly felt his head beaten down by the blunt edge of the sword to which the attacker continued to laugh, though not as destructively as before. Ren knew most of Mantus's strength was in breakneck pounces and limb movements, but this only further spelled disaster for him as he did not have a lot of room to evade. Badly, his foes would soon encounter boredom. Out of the corner of his vision Ren spied the back wall starting to blossom once more, but this time only faintly. The barrier was closeby. To Ren's astonishment, the Compass and the Treasure in the clutch of his adversary were detectably glowing too. Bloth had not noticed. Ren now understood this would be his only hope.

"That's enough, Mantus. You may collect the gold from Konk he owes you." Bloth tiredly grumbled, he was becoming disinterested in the fight now.

"Really Milord? I haven't even gotten this screaming worm pleading yet! He needs to be taught that no boy Or man can best My swordsmanship." Mantus grinned and evilly edged on, apparently wanting to break his target.

"Very well, but if he doesn't squeal soon we're getting rid of him." Bloth's droning intone had almost faded, though he believed it a tad strange that Mantus was behaving unusually unmethodical. Still, he decided to entertain the cohort for a little while as he was enjoying tormenting Ren moreso.

"I'll never beg to you!" Ren goaded with a yell. He very frightfully dashed around the grandiose man who was blocking the door in the room as he feared he might be grabbed, but the leviathan let him cross. He set up a good position to attempt a strike, and when the prowling criminal's fervid sword licked at him, he swiftly pounced to swipe the Treasure from the belt and tried to catch his foot in the loop to climb up the bloated torso for the Compass. Bloth caught on too late, Ren found himself trashed into a solid-stone wall but he managed to recover both items. He could only pray to Kuunda his plan would work when he won less than a flash to vamoose from the now enraged saffron-sighted figure that was barreling toward him. He quickly thrust the sapphire Compass into the indentation of the 13th Treasure of Rule. He procured a brilliant effulgence, and felt a sting when something had hit him. Not knowing what it was, he rolled over for the oppressive wall which twinkled in a gleaming aurora as well. To his superb amazement, the hindrance melted away before his eyes.

From the city of Octopon, the flare of a lighthouse glimmered. Trees and foliage flourished, bountifully bursting with growth. On sparkling sands, an adolescent lay. Beautiful azure waves flowed and receded, sea-birds cawed from the air. Sailboats in the distance easily rocked on the restful current. From the dampened silt, a prince creaked open two glossy eyes.

"Hello, Ren." The sound emitted from a pulsing aura, at first not seen as any more than a blur.

"How do you who I am?" Ren's obscure gander and idleness soon followed. He gawked about at his surroundings and puzzled, Octopon was restored. Completely and timely, restored. His attention fazed back on the globule of light. No one else was around.

"We have met once before, but this time I am unjoined." The sweetly vocal splendor avowed.

"There were two of you! You were the Treasure I found on Del-" Ren stuttered with esteem, his presence clarified to him. Upon further inspection he could see she was a butterfly, letting out the radiance of a cloud.

"I'm more than that! Don't you know? Were you told, my cousin? Your Father was among the Sons of Queen Avadasia of Octopon." The tiny butterfly flit back and forth, divulging her enigma. "I'm also a Treasure of Rule by Birth. I did not know until after my Spirit was finally released, I escaped from my end with the energy I stored in the Compass of Rule, the River of the North." She fluttered to Ren's ear, whispering her testimony.

"When I embodied the 9th Treasure of Rule from the River under Arakna Island I thought I had attained Kuunda's destiny. Until Bloth said he tried to take the River of Toishok on Northern Qui-Qua for himself. I was told you are the Greatest threat to the Dark Dweller, come to life-You were the woman who can move dark water from the myth!" The seeker numbed in his spot, dazzled by an improbable power.

"When Queen Avadasia swallowed the Thirteenth Treasure of Rule and the Compass from a younger King Primus, she melted from the impact. The last Treasures transformed into two Rivers, the River of Rebirth underneath Arakna Island and between the to the North Pole of Mer, the River of Toishok. During the time of the Treasures' meltdown some of the energy from the explosion fused into human life, I was one of those to receive that composition through inheritance." The mystical show fanned her tail to confidently retell, a trail of steam faded around her hazy color.

"Both of them...and him, didn't he...? That's the sense I'm getting." Ren confused himself with the essence flooding his discernment. She danced in front of his face.

"No. Breaking us failed. Unlike it only takes a Drop of Darkness to distort all Light, it takes a Hair of Light to evade all Darkness. In my case, only one person witnessed my Soul depart. For twelve years I've met the call as part of the true energy of this world against the Dark Queen Avadasia unleashed on our planet's beyond, freed by a hair from my own head and a Divine Ecomancer's magic." The apparition delivered directly to him, a trail of enchantment followed as the Spirit laid on a nearby tuft of sea-grass. "Son of Avadasia, ntus, was lured by the glow inside of me but he could not see or prevent the prophecy of Spirit from transpiring for himself. My arms were melted for my disobedience, my chiding words recorded one day after I told Zoolie of the Sun the importance of my Father's place. Your friend, Ioz, was almost lost with him but I saw to it that they both were protected for their brave hearts. I was too fearful to stand up for myself alive, and the Treasure inside me has given me a second chance. The place you see before you is Octopon's future, and my current world." Before she could go any further, the image transformed from glowing wings of bittersweet ruby to a delicate woman. She beamed at Ren as she pushed a lock of garnet-rose from her eyes.

"Prophecy? You didn't really die like they thought you did, did you? At least, not all of you." Ren fumbled with ideas and flashes. On the horizon, he witnessed a ship. One so familiar, and one he remembered Avagon had spoken of. He hazily gathered the vision of the locks of pure frost from the royal skipper.

"You see in my life I was unaware of my Seeraye status caused by my essence. My Treasure type is a mystic who can predict the destiny of anyone but their own. The feelings I felt were similar to your friend Tula, because of it, I was able to save her life." The meek beauty shone with a swipe of her fullest hand and a grove of minga-trees blossomed and bore the ripest fruit. She blinked akin eyes and awaited Ren's willing reply.

"So this is what Octopon will be like after I recover the final Treasures...and you saved Tula?" Ren marvelously wondered. He awed at the perfect oasis of clarion skies and crystal water. With his left palm he plucked a sea-lily and basked in the gentle scent as he laid it under his nose. This world he was in did not feel fake. The dark water no longer presided here and he could not sense a trace of it on any flower or grain of the beach. Not in the mist, or on beast and humans. It did feel exactly like home, nothing like he remembered but faultlessly in place and sublime. Abundant dagrons and exotic creatures surfed the breeze, a bameme scuttled across his foot. He didn't feel a sting or any pain. Everything was completely right, and he sighed with contentment. The Seeraye took the stem and twirled it about her hands.

"I helped Tula escape from a doom that would be. She had been taken with another ecomancer at the time because of her now influential abilities. She wasn't known then as she is known today, her Andorian name was Tulina. When I knew her in my human essence, she couldn't remember any details from her capture. Your lucky friend's life was one big chance with the most risky players imaginable, her safety on the line of a battle between the two most powerful swordsmen in the twenty seas. For Bloth only knew of the existence of one River, the River of Toishok, and he could not see the guide in front of his eyes as he searched relentlessly to claim it. So, he sent Mantus to scout on any word of it while he sought to find the Chosen Ecomancer for the day he would have all thirteen. If the gold trunk I placed Tulina inside would have been opened while in seeking of what was believed to be the first Treasure of Rule she would have been confiscated and put to death. I knew it's unknowing owner would be robbed that day by the only rival capable of defeating him in swordsmanship, a captain of the fastest of Aksort vessels ever forged. When the surrogate pirate took her in on his ship called the Wraith, Tulina continued to say her name but it sounded different to her captain. The three men paid for her good fortune. Joat and Konk have not suffered death since then, Mantus will be protected as well, a consequence for the life they unknowingly spared." The peculiar audience told of mysterious detail.

"But you weren't." Ren read the life quavering from the divine vision.

"I never died, not in spirit." The terrestrial star twinkled. She attended to Ren with a duteous signal, bowing before the majestic visitor.

"You're kind. Thank you." Ren flashed his shy stare with a gracious admiration, somehow she knew and could tell him his every mood along with those of others. "Tell me, who are you?" With a yearning zeal he respectfully begged moreover. He stroked the petals of the lily she returned. The sky reshaped to a spread of crimson cast.

"Can't you already distinguish me? Your memories are restored. The lost 14th Treasure of Rule and the Soul of the Compass you carry belonged to my father Mizar, he passed on his potentiality to me, Child of the River. Our Fathers were binding the Compass from the River of Toiishok claimed far North, as you are with the Treasure from the River of Rebirth under Arakna Island. Because you've released me, I can grant you my will and all will soon know of the power within. The cruelest Darkness cannot destroy the Spirit, and it is Darkest just before Dawn. Inside you are strong, that is what my Father always said. Run away, you can now." She declined from her resonance of her foremost reality and floated in front of Ren's eyes, inciting her departure. "May the Light of the Sun show you Truth. When you see him, and you can, tell him kayra-din bids him Farewell." kayra-din finally desired in her flight, ascending to the zenith of the sunlit sky.

"Kayraadin?" Ren rolled over with ponder for what felt like forever, even though She was gone.

"Hurry, Zoolie!" Ren heard the cry of a desperate woman scream from the wall that dissolved away, one he recognized.

"Aye, I can only go as fast as this jitatan thing'll let me!" Zoolie's voice rung out through the melted structure. The remnants of the stone bashed in as the foreign weapon collided with the confines.

"Tula!" Ren cheered his dear shipmate's name as if he had not seen her in years.

"Go, Ren!" Tula furiously screamed to the prince, grabbing him by the shoulder and pushing him astern with all exigency. "Ioz and Niddler will be here soon, you have to get out of here!" She insisted and urged him to go. Ren hesitated to move.

"We'll make quick work of them! Now, Mantus!" Bloth infuriatingly bellowed, befouled in demand. He drew his frightening blade, ready to shred whatever stood in his way.

"Noy borga! The wench?!" Mantus's steely blues penetrated as he faltered. Dumbfounded by the female who had broken through the wall, he had been caught off-guard. Tula, in turn, jerked around to meet his gaze. Never before in his life did he see such furor embodied into one expression.

"Mantus!" Tula's impugnment met it's frozen target with such vehemency, it could have knocked him off a ship full of borca-paste. "You learn so much on one dagron ride." Tula laughed sinisterly and morbidly, almost so demonic in vitality that it was surreal. She stalked toward the pale and decaying form of the underhanded second-in-command. Slowly impending, her dilated and reckless green eyes showed null but infernal rage. Almost inhumanly scary, she approached closer. Mantus stood stunned. "I know exactly what you did, you deplorable cold-blooded-brute! Ioz and Zoolie told me..." Tula paused for only an instant and continued. "All, about it!" Her inflection hurriedly grew. "In detail!" She at last roared out. Mantus iced to the spot, wanting to lift his blade but for some reason, he could not will his quick reflexes to move this time. "But you know what?" Tula drew forward, her whisper becoming stormily calm. "There was only one cutthroat in the twenty seas whom Bloth knew was more evil than you are." Tula proceeded to collectedly speak, before her face formed a smirk. "It's this woman! Now, I'll heave. You! Off! Repugnant dirt! I'll take you to the Janda-town Jewelry Market!" Tula screamed as she ran forward in an insane gale and rose her scimitar to the wind. She swung at Mantus, who only managed to block with no efficacy in his arms.

"Ahoy there, Mantus!" Zoolie greeted the wormy figure with a jolly smile as he staved off Bloth's extravagant edge. Mantus gaped at him, confounded and bitter. The jubilant tavernowner peeked over at Tula. "Have at 'im Tula!" He encouraged the enraged warrioress of raven locks, conveying a charming wink. He diverged back to fending off Bloth's monstrous attacks, whom did not pay her any heed.

"You! Wench!" Two words were all Mantus had been capable of yelling as Tula hacked and slashed away at his blade, which he could not get a good handle on. Too staggered that a woman would properly stand up against him, he trembled with wrath. His limbs would not react the way he wished them to.

Ren regressed to the courtyard where Zoolie and Tula had busted through, he nestled the 13th Treasure of Rule in his arms to run for some path of escape. His friends were fighting Bloth and Mantus so valiantly, for him. He tried to get a hand in either of their tussles, but they were not afflicted. He backpedaled farther out into the deepset enclosure when he glimpsed at Bloth's jumbo toes hurdling for him. Crunched beneath a shelf too short for an Octarian Ox to hide under, he apprehensively wondered what he should do. Bloth lumbered for the indented nook when Ren's loud shifting drew his bitten ear but a defender resumed the chase before the sheltered escape-artist could be seen.

"How's the pirating going for you, Bloth? Still scuttlin' across the twenty seas? I heard ya got a new boat!" Zoolie made easy conversation with the Pirate Lord as he pounded metal against the relentless Captain.

"When I get my hands on you..." Bloth seethed and threatened the diabolically happy red-head, he tore his blade which did not resolve anymore than that of his opponent. "Mantus! Hurry, find Ren and get the Treasure!" He barked out to the only underling who could help him, hoping his partner was having better luck.

"I killed your legs!" Mantus yelled in the downfall of perpetual maneuvers before his eyes. Frustratingly, he could not even stop a worthless whelp from flying a dagron for rescue. Jazhea could remain level as long as she was not knocked upside-down.

"Jazhea!" From Zoolie's side Tula called the name of the noblewoman as she clung onto the safeguarding scimitar. "Here! Thank you!" She shouted in regard, chucking back the accompaniment Amulet belonging to her peer.

"But..." The blond began to protest but she affixed the chain, dropping it over her head amid the torrential gale.

"This can't be, I'm actually trying to win!" Mantus lunged to avoid Tula's storming blitz, the switchblade on the heel of his boot struck for her face but skipped off-slant. "I was hesitant to reconsider a endgame barrage instead of playing this elaborate scheme. I was a smool-brain for urging Bloth to hold back all along!" He tumbled on to a hard rockbase with a treble yelp as he realized his terminal error far too late, tears from tremendous ache almost bound his motion completely.

"I know now, you're part of the reason Mer is this way. Now I'm going to do what is right and finish you! You cheated Ioz into joining Bloth to begin with, he didn't willingly become one of your darva-worms, you wrecked his family's cargo boat in Tayhoj because Kauldron told you his father knew of a way to forge a tracker for the Treasures of Rule, and then you threatened Taneuka's ship after Ioz found refuge. He would have crewed on his own or went home, but then you played your Sport on his fears for Solia and his loyalty to Raymit so he couldn't say no. You will pay for what you did to Zoolie and Kayraadin! You set them both up and tore them apart, how dare you! Was I the only woman to ever stand up to you!?" Tula capably high-kicked Mantus out of a settled level, proving her stamina superior by much to her crawling competitor. "Well here's another, sea-scum!" She pounced through the stale air with a tenacious wallop of sea-ballet and strut with rile, tastefully spinning away. Mantus yowled at failure to pleasantly stand on beaten legs.

Mantus did not want to answer his master to inform of the hopeless situation, Tula raided away at his arm. Mantus transfixed on his own failure, helplessly exasperated and tremoring with animosity. He glanced at his boss for only an instant, a quake filled the dungeon of heavy block. Mantus's archnemesis, Zoolie, had done the impossible. The hefty giant lay on the ground, not dead but sabotaged. He realized he should not have looked away, even for a moment. His own blade clashed into the wall at the side, disarming him. "Even if he can't use the map anymore it's the disciple's Serum, it's hidden you imbeccib-" When he at last mustered the courage to speak up as a diversion, this time his words fell on deaf ears.

"Who would listen to you, bilge-scum?! Make one more move to hurt any of us and I promise Kuunda I'll trim you where your Quiin ego will hurt!" Tula shrieked with an unrestrained vengeance. She picked up his lapsed weapon with a slide and heaved it to compel Mantus to skirt to the sidelines from fright. It crashed below once more as the feminine arm flung him into a nearby barrel and kicked him into the barrier. Destructive wind now whirled about the enclosure, it blurred the splashes of blue and pink and hauled him into the wall again, where he painfully bumped his head. The gust whipped around like a cyclone, the woman who defeated him still moved as if not encumbered at all.

The princess hazardously searched for her brother through the crossfire inside until a sparkling glint found her, she slid over. Ren listened to a beckon from near. "It's too dangerous, I shouldn't be here. It was my fault for being captured." Jazhea condemned her own actions, she concealed a stabbing injury with her palm.

"It wasn't. It still isn't a good idea to stay here, but you're hurt." Ren told her warningly, Jazhea rested in the sandy courtyard.

"I'll be alright. It's just a trivial wound. Ren, you have to know something. Taneuka told me what happened when I traveled with her, she was my partner that whole time I was looking for Ella. This was before I knew you were alive, and found you." Jazhea began to ramble as she peeked cautiously over to the warfare taking place. "I didn't talk about the morning of the Moonsail Festival it because it was too gr-" She trailed herself to a dribble.

"I know." Ren finished for her.

"Partially why I set out was find out what happened. kayra-din said she would return home in those letters she sent to us, after she had talked Mizar's way out from Bloth and his cruel second-in-command. Saytai...by a chance search, couldn't find Phorlock and saved kayra-din's father after he had escaped from the Maelstrom. I talked to Saytai, she told me of what was written on that map Loren gave you. Bloth was tipped off on it at some point after Mizar was his prisoner. Taneuka's father's heirloom was stolen from her the very morning cousin disappeared. Whenever she and kayra-din saw each other she kept mentioning something called The Surge..." Jazhea muddled on, creaking slightly in pitch. "Here, they used to sail together when kayra-din was young and I still lived on Kalinda." She coughed and retrieved a bitty rectangular frame for Ren, scrawling a quiet inking on the reverse.

"I should really be going back, my friends need me...I have to stop Bloth and Mantus from raiding Octopon to the ground! Stay here, where it's safe." Ren peered in between the two difficulties battling for his attention. Tula and Zoolie were holding their own in the dungeon, Jazhea was weak and needed somewhere to go, but he would be caught in wrongdoing to leave either one. He squinted at the picture of a younger Captain Taneuka, to the right of her stood a tanned girl who bore a blush bob. Scarlet and rose bangs, blue eyes dotted the face framed by short hair. He began to read Jazhea's composition.

Tula is given the Protective half of the Amulet of Devotion Kayraadin gave to me when I was a young girl living in Kalinda with Phorlock when he watched over us. The Charging half of the artifact she gave to Taneuka, and Ioz may keep it as she has given it to him. When I am gone you will receive the vast fortune I am appointed heiress to because I am indebted to you. You saved my life again, and I have to repay you. You are my brother I had always hoped to meet, continue the Quest for me always.

"Jazhea, you need to rest. There are many people who need to be cured of ailments only the Treasures can fix, including your own. You keep your fortune, you will need it much more than me." From Jazhea Ren had heard those peculiar words again, The Surge. He urged her to lay down, thinking she was delusional.

"It's too late for me, I'm saying goodbye with no one." Jazhea lifted her back to a rest, she held up her rejection of his offer through a motionless burden of what was left.

"Even the loneliest people have someone. You don't have to die alone." Ren remained at her final breaths.

"It wasn't the bugs, which I'm glad, but now I can't see. You'll have to fly the rest of the way, I was lucky to have this long since-!" Jazhea suddenly descended after completely loosing her vision. She faded to an early slumber. Ren guarded as her person melted to haze, he shimmied toward the havoc and undertook lows of a flat mantle under the brick surface.

Tula budged from her huddle and severed the hanging quills of Mantus's lip, he woefully mourned his loss. The ecomancer gasped at what she had done on accident. It suddenly became quiet, then it erupted in chaos. In the corner, a similar identity with a shaded ponytail was instantly clutched by the fallen enemy who produced a handheld stinger. Mantus skipped from the ground, hooking the concealed visitor by the torso.

"Back off or the wench takes a dive into a sea of nightmares! Your friend, Jargis, had her personally delivered after you left! Now she'll be there for much comfort on my raids!" Mantus screeched with a mania, the dart hovered over the stiffened character's shocked eyes. Solia was a statue.

"No! The real venom is orange and solid, then it's not the variety Ioz was hit with!" Tula plunged forward as she outcried, stumbling to reach the boundary in time but she too halted before the crazed hijacker.

"Stop now! Unless you want me to inject her with the concentrated venom of genuine Dartha-Nightmare-Eels! How fortunate Lord Bloth and I were during our expedition to Biperia, this scroll describing the workings of Bone-sorcery enchantments from Obrik's library should sufficiently play them for...indescribable reactions." Mantus continued his monstrous report as he tipped his gander at a scroll squelched underneath his arm. Under his thumb and pointed at Solia's ear was a different dart from the pistol threatening Ren. Inside squirmed what appeared to be a purple glop, one which was living and breathing.

"He's flipped his clam shells!" Zoolie yielded immediately. Tula desisted her movements, unable to breathe.

"So wrong you were Phorlock and Saytasi for thinking I was incapable of something so horrendous and impossible! Thinking I would pay what I've done! I'll dine on delicious yuugla-fin every moonrise, my quarters will be spotlessly soaked in grog! All the amenities of the Moonsail festivities of twelve years ago and more! Back off!" The commander, who was bordering on mentally unstable, ranted with a maddened leer. "You, wench-Solia, I'll give you a nice position serving me for the rest of your life, when Bloth and myself rule all of Mer!" His condition exploded. With his right thumb, he had pressed back the spring directly into Solia's head. "I'll take what I want from you, my piece of maggot-fare, and you'll soon enjoy the life of a personal wench! I will keep you with my riches!" He cackled chaotically, scratching nails putridly along the woman's back. Bloth sneered victoriously in the background, he wrangled Zoolie by the massive arm.

"That's the worst thing he can possibly do! By Daven's beard, Ioz wasn't telling any gaada-lie! Mantus, you're a jitatan bilge-leech! He never gave Kayrn' the antidote when Ioz and I tried to stop him." Zoolie blundered with declining words as he uncannily watched Mantus shriek with hilarity. "Watch your north-wind Blue-Lips, I'll be outta work and disappointed if me clientele doesn't tip or put away their glass! Dagrons can't sting, but they sure can bite!" Zoolie elbowed Bloth in the gut with a sore zinger, the giants then proceeded to scuffle.

"Noy borga! What did I do to deserve this?!" Solia screeched as she was entirely repulsed. She became like ice when lips wet and slobbery crept up the spine of her neck.

"Stay away from me!" Mantus hissed with contempt.

"You've never seen a real woman like me before, have you, Mantus?" Tula purred as she strut forward and untied her waistsash, flinging it in the air. She chuckled as she waggled her hips. Mantus wasn't paying attention to her face but for only one moment he ogled at the swaying of curves. His vising grip loosened on Solia then dangled her a fingerbreadth from dropping, protruding eyes locked on the charmer and slowly blinked. "I'll bet you can steal a lot of heads with that shining sword of yours. Yes, I'm sure they're quite taken by your daring mustache-rings and your wealthy nose. I'll also bet any woman can tell you're a brave and capable pirate...But you know, Mantus, real hips will sink your shi-I don't care what you did, I'm saving you!" Tula defiantly proclaimed in the intense situation, she steeled her view straight at the estranged hostage and boldly sliced through the stilling room to tear her away.

"By Ioz's angry soul, someone needs to teach you about the dagrons and the monkeybirds, kelp-booter. Your lips smell like borca-paste, so keep them to yourself! Mind your manners to the lasses and don't mess with their jewelry, mate!" Zoolie severely uproared, solid fist connecting with a frigid jaw as he left his current wrestle.

"That wench was mine to rob! You don't just do that!" Mantus squealed in a distinctly indignant tantrum as he was clout back into sanity by kick into the wall from Tula. He wiped his now toothless mouth.

"I just did!" Tula callously roared as she slammed Mantus back against the floor. Tula ripped Solia away by her thin wrist and flung her at the rotund hero in back.

"Ahoy Mantus, you want this?" Sliding away from Bloth who was beating his fists in rage, Zoolie agilely teased the second-in-command. Above his head he suspended a single fleck of something glittering. The gnash from a bed of frazzled hair of onyx and bloodshot eyes accelerated for the one piece.

"Mantus, you kreld-minded ignoramus! Find Ren!" Bloth blasted in rebellion over his mire. The tavernowner fondly gleamed.

"That one piece of gold...Bloth docked me out of for...Many Months! Many Months! What it would have accumulated to! Do you know?!" Mantus's hurls racked with pants of greed and lust, soaring one crooked arm to the inclined ceiling in a hankering hunt for reprisal.

"About 8 pieces, Mantus. I think, if he docked it after our last fight. 'Bout as many districts in Octopon, you kook." Zoolie slunk to a backslide, sputtering with a nervy stun.

"Eight pieces!" Mantus collapsed on ground in a disconsolate heap, howling out to above.

"Do you really want an extra minga-melon or two with that much? You were giving away twice when you were marking everything Z.M.Q. and masterminding that Polar Prince shell-deal." Zoolie foiled the rival's stab of the hand at the false drabul. Switching between a ridiculous ruckus, he waddled about and batted away Bloth's ill wham. Tula crouched in evasive delay for a halt.

"They raised the prices!" The manic bladesman rued over himself as he swiped a barrel at Zoolie, the manager sidestepped as trite.

"I'd guess naming your signature E.M.Q. or K.M.Q. made it too obvious, you would have been better off with Z.P.Q. if you were gonna rob Bloth's skips under that half-masted moniker without his knowledge. So how many of Z.M.Q.'s gullible pups sent their earnings' to 4-1-9 Janda-town, Zuuror Mantus of Qui-Qua? Nothing like rowing on your old man's rudder and using his title to scam dock-bums. Don't you know, Mantus? It's a bad moon for pirating!" The barman snatched Mantus's only living wrist in a husky fist, smilingly nimble. The cutthroat commander squirmed and clawed, voraciously angry of his strategic sham figured out as nothing at all.

"It's mine!" Mantus toiled to free himself, he yowled and slacked a brutish heel at the gut. Zoolie rolled the lone circle over his palm and caught it between a gap of the hand.

"Even if I give it to you, you won't hold on to it!" Zoolie scolded as Mantus dropped with a centralized grimace.

"Can you walk?" Ren tenderly rushed out from underneath the trim wrapping the dungeon loft, scampering to the aid of Solia. He hustled her outside the prison.

"There you go! Have fun, Sport." Zoolie gladly chuckled away the tiny coin, releasing himself from the wrought gold-grubber.

"It's mine! Every wench and gold piece is mine, all mine! I don't have to share with any man!" The dexterous commander delightfully relished in his single drabul, solacing himself with ultimate bliss. Then he noticed something, a menial scratch on the would-be smooth surface. "It's fake!" He wailed in ultimate agony as he foiled the chip of glittering timber onto the ground, pouting like a forsaken sea-pooch.

"So is this scroll. Zoolie, do you want a recipe for Biperian-eggnog?" Tula offered with a simmering wonder as she pried upon the parchment Mantus had abandoned to reach for the counterfeit currency.

"Only if it's spiked. Ah scuttlebuckets! That reminds me I gotta fill up the tankard-cellar this week. Can't wait til Septoponmoon." Zoolie speedily responded as he multitasked with his cutter underneath his arm and a hefty kick to Bloth's paunch. Mantus cracked the Eel-blood pistol on the landing and it spilled out to reveal an emerald muck. "It was muddy seawater, you doolie kreld-eater. You snapped a jitatan mizzen that you couldn't tell the difference! I told you, you'd be paying Kuunda's fee." He assailed with a finishing jump to his chunky enemy while taunting the other. He had nearly returned Bloth to a debilitated state. "Your second-in-command frames an honest swab so he doesn't get caught!" He focused on the main foe with his statement, he crossed his expression with a smirk. The Pirate Lord merely sneered.

"Where is Mantus hiding now? I have a few questions for him to answer." Tula turned from her task to rummage for the termagant raider.

"Over there, squealing about 8 pieces of gold and minga-melons." Zoolie pointed the sorceress in the correct spot.

"You don't care about how Ioz's father died before his own eyes! All because of your jitatan greed..." Tula ferociously sibilated, energetically pressing the swordless Mantus back to his knees.

"So did mine!" Mantus anguished with a vanquished protest.

"How does it feel to be overcome by your own prey, insect?" Tula laughed heartlessly when Mantus bore up at her with a defeated expression of gall. "I know you can't stand me for what I am, worm. But you know what, Mantus? I lied, I'm not as evil as you are. You'll be killed, humanely. Even though you don't deserve it, kreld-eater." The strong-minded woman scowled and raised her blade over the frail man's head, snubbing him with a look of ice. "Now tell me, about this Disciple's Serum." Tula cornered Mantus in supremacy, with a guaranteed bravado she endangered the conquered Quin-male by raising the core of electric sparkles. She cleaved lightning in her palm.

"The Serum Bloth and Morpho used from the River of Toishuok...I don't know anything about it. Just kill me already." Mantus defenselessly shriveled with venal despise and cowardice. Tula discharged her bolt, pleased with the the traumatized wreck she had left of the commander on the floor.

"Tula, I'm starting to get worried." Tula necessitated a glance to the round rescuer speaking to her from across the busted cell. "I knew they fell back before, but I thought Ioz and his feather-head would be here by now." Zoolie deliberated sensibly, bothered as he whipped a sword away from the fallen Bloth and unmoving gaze of whom had blanked-out.

Tula glimpsed at Mantus, who had been laying still on the ground and finally settled. However, she had drawn her blade at him and watched him carefully from her stance. His wormy eyes were focused at the wall. "You're right, Zoolie. Maybe it wasn't such a good idea to let them alone in case we were intercepted." Tula tentatively mused. "Where's Ren, we have to protect him until they arri-" Tula tried to continue her words but soon stopped when she heard the alarming commotion.

"Tula!" Tula descried Ren's scream from behind her, just a little too late. He was coming back after failing to find avenue to refuge, as not to alert Bloth he ducked beneath his outlet.

"Mantus!" The uproarious captain barked, a grisly eye of yellow rotated and focused on the foul plunderer then the young heroine in the room. By the time the call sounded, only an interval had passed and she could do no more. Tula must be the Chosen Ecomancer, when I obtain the Treasures from Ren I can have her, for all purposes. Bloth began to internally scheme.

"Natchut!" The deadening outcry filled the ears of three heroes. Ren only scantly dashed it out in time, he covered his nostrils. Tula's upset eyes saw the dagger of an urchin launch and dig itself into the crevice behind her. The commander cast something to his employer, who clutched it and swallowed after appointing a gross arm in front of his face. Mantus himself did the same, gulping an obscure item and guarding his intakes with a dull-blue sleeve.

"Well done, Mantus. I suppose all those tireless drills paid off." The sinister and hateful drudge poured through the dreary clouds.

"Prepared as always, Bloth. Did you think I would undertake such a perilous mission as this one without the necessary precautions?" Mantus bragged awfully of his martialism.

The ravaging gas saturated the room and Tula sensed her limbs giving way, she could not sway or lift her body as much as her soul compelled her to. She felt trapped, imprisoned in her own mass. She browsed over at her ally who had fallen crippled to the floor. She sharpened her gaze upon the blond-haired boy running to help her. "Ren!" Tula feebly called out. She slowly tried to push her sword away to him without being noticed.

"A real woman? You're no figurehead," The dirty commander approached her with a straightforward frown. "But your enchantress-wiggle appears very, Rewarding. I'll reconsider." Mantus browsed the fallen beauty with a taunting grunt. Tula's eyes bulged.

Mantus had inclined away from her. "It's unfortunate we couldn't find any kutlack this time, Milord. I would have liked to see these slugs convulse until their end, that doesn't have an antidote." Mantus dryly menaced with grimacing articulation. He aimed his scandalous vision upon the innkeeper on the floor.

"Next time, Mantus." Bloth plainly dismissed as he equipped his steel for all scatter, the impending youth with the golden ponytail.

"It's only too bad we aren't shipmates anymore, Zoolie. Then you could have joined your preciously-treasonous kay in a watery grave!" The strategist hissed with loathing at the red-haired oaf on the floor. "Very priceless when I scraped her out of that bilge-hold, still alive." He cruelly demeaned. "All in a day's work, she meant as much to you as she did me. You're a useless coward, unworthy of defeating me yourself, it's why you run away.

"Your traitor Ioz stole away the hair/eyes of the Sun, and any chance of you taking me down with it. You sent this smilge out to destroy me!" He coldly laughed. "Wasteful pushover. I showed her what a superior Pirate of the Blade can do, like she knew you never were, but you." He broke off. "Will." He promised with the lash back of his sword. "Die like one. Now, Zoolie!" He violently rebuked, seemingly ready to strike the blow to settle the score.

"No-o you-creep! You bloodlust...ing-monster!" Tula obtained enough brazen stamina to wheeze out a distraction. Mantus had not noticed what she intended on doing, but it beguiled his attention away.

"Ah, kreld-head." Mantus solely inflected. "Woman." He deviated with nasty eyes to wander the ecomancer a glower of venom. "Get used to your sunken view because I don't think you deserve any antidote for your distress. Don't think you won't answer for your misdeed, you'll provide me much Sport later. At the very least, a good practice session. Maybe even a prize if I can slash some of that scuddy exterior off of you." He crafted an intimidating promise, the rapacious aggressor pointed his slicing blade at her head. He blared her a decrepit and toothless sneer.

"How low-are you...? Are you even-human? Don't call me your woman!" Tula collapsed through an ache of twitching, her heart hammered when she tried to fight it. She did not want to know what this meant, she felt a boot press against her crown as he leaned down to speak to her.

"Smart assessment, wench. You're as fatuous as your colleague Ioz was, back when we used to share a barrel. Before he found out I told Bloth of his pitiful resentment over his worthless seadog. On that telling bloodmoon Raymit garnished a little help pleading his confession to pilfering everyone. Very profitable for Z.M.Q., indeed." Mantus added with a confirming laugh.

"When Ioz says it-ss nice. When you say, it-s sickening...and he's nothing like you!" Tula shuddered out with repellency, creating a diversion with her raving.

"You think that will be the worst you receive? You'll stay alive if you're lucrative." Mantus only bulged Tula a creepy leer as he snickered out his last phrase to the female. He looped away from her to pile gold from a pouch on the floor into a trunk as if packing up, then arose with coins pressed under his loose sleeve. Tula guided her wink to Ren, who rocked back at Bloth's swishing metal near the slat in the foundation. The noble recovered from the noise which nearly upset his cover from being caught. The Pirate Lord retired the pursuit, not wanting to bend so low.

The barkeep exchanged a glance with the ecomancer. Unfortunately, the mastermind focused his attention on Zoolie. "Well, Zoolie, all the trouble you've caused me will be for naught." With a glare at his squirming kill the cold-blood stopped to chuckle. "After Lord Bloth and I reclaim what's rightfully ours-" The militant bladesman began to gloat, ecstatic that he was finally winning. Frigid eyes tried to penetrate the quintessence of hope.

Zoolie beamed his scrutiny to the slithering corpse above him. He saw Tula pushing her scimitar to Ren with what minuscule range of motion that still remained. The sun-bearded barman could not move at all except for his eyes, but he did not have the prowess or fortitude of an ecomancer. He could not have been surprised by Mantus's heartlessness, but for once he let it take over. His eyes wrenched when he stared up at the suppressive and scheming criminal above him. Mantus did not detect anything amiss, nor did he turn around to glance at the status behind him. The vile swindler vaunted at his prey, in glory.

"Leave him! Stop your blabbering and get Ren!" Bloth clamored out in a rage to the second-in-command to pique him from a stupor, motioning to the young prince hastening the blade out of the mystic's cracking hand, whom he could not reach swiftly enough. Mantus involuntarily turned away from Zoolie, at his overlord's whim.

"Take it, Ren!" Tula cried out through a fleeting voice, her hand sealed against her will but Ren was enabled to pry her fingers free.

"I owe you everything, Tula!" Ren desperately hurried out. The instant he freed Tula's edge, he saw the nose-ringed skeleton lunging for him with a warcry. He quickly paced backward and blocked the malevolent slicer.

"Get him! If he gets away you'll follow in his fate!" Ren heard Bloth screaming at the subordinate, being pursued through the courtyard that led to freedom. Ren met a wide and dismal field surrounded by four unscalable walls. The only life contained within the confines were spiky needlelike trees and an array of dangerous Dexolors. Fortunately, the giant salamanders with stingers of paralysis did not seem to pay mind at first. "Don't you dare try to move!" Ren listened to the clumsy and deadly ox blare a second time at his mates left in the cell. Ren concentrated instead on fleeing from the nearing danger, at least until he could come up with some ploy. Terribly, pools of black water were scattered throughout the paths of the area. Mantus was coming after Ren with a weapon ready to destroy. The prince achieved commodious distance before the haggard figure hurdled for the quarry, derailing him in his tracks.

"Do you really think you can best me in a duel, Son of Primus? Even if you had the strength of a Galquin you would fall to me, jitata boy!" The swordsman coldly challenged Ren as he slivered at the head, just managing to miss. The repugnant Pirate Lord was a breadth away.

"No." Ren agreed as he dropped to attempt a missed lick of a boot at Mantus from the ground. "I'm sure Bloth can though." He mentally stabbed at his opponent, trying to throw him off his guard if only for an instant. He successfully blocked the mangy-maned bandit's hit upon resurface. He nearly tripped over one of the Dexolor, to his misfortune. Instead of going after him, it was for some reason drawing toward the broken cell. He calcified in his purport on the intimidating assassin.

"Insolent boy. When I take this Treasure from you for Bloth, we'll leave this place, and you, to writhe in dark." Mantus rasped a crooked and wily laugh, leering as he fiercely clashed metal against Ren's weapon.

"Then let us determine our fate in a fair duel!" Ren tarried the strategist's mauling flurry, pitching his crafty idea.

"Are you sure you're grown up enough to play with the men, little boy?" Mantus was so pleasantly satisfied with his prevalence of advantage that he scoffed at any denial Ren would hie to brag.

"If you are a real man, then tell me you're not afraid of a fearless contest of warrior's blood in a one-on-one competition between men! By my honorable word, I will defeat you!" Ren wholly vowed with a rigorous opening of confidence. Mantus roughly cycled with a heel pivot, enticed by such audacity.

"If that is so, how high are the stakes between real warriors? You're willing to bet your Quest and your life on your word?" The aggressor confronted the fortuitous venturer, hindering any withdraw as he stalled and waited for how much was to be put on the line.

"Yes." Ren answered beyond a shadow of legitimate doubt, knowing the future of Octopon would depend on the outcome of the battle between he and Mantus.

"This should level it off. Even on your honorable duty to the safety and dignity of that...hexed-up wench over there?" The gambling slayer's neck slowly curved, he retained his mindful composure but the lust lingered in his stare on Tula. His study of her body was hawkish like a radar, tracing up and down her petrified shape.

"Ren, no..." Tula grieved in despair, knowing that her friend should never trust his current opponent to play anything but foul.

"Yes, I am." Ren lowered his glare but resumed his gameface, the sounds uttered from his tongue made him wince in sheer noxiousness.

"If I win I'm going make her hail her King's name, and she will praise every moment of my steering hands on her. Her perky voice should return very timely, fitting sounds as you scream your last breath from a dark grave." After Mantus spat out an apathetic clunk and set his swanky appetite on luscious Tula, her eyes bulged.

"I'm not afraid of you, Mantus. I am going to win and you will pay for what you have done. I accept, now play!" Ren vigorously angered the snickering contender enough to rub a fresh bruise on his cheek, he had clapped Mantus in the jawbone and off a patient guard. Success would be impossible when he was stepping into exactly what Mantus wanted all along and risking his dearest's humanity on a game of chance, becoming no better than an undeserving lout should he lose.

"So be it then that your word dooms you to shame. I'm going to enjoy watching you tremble when you give me all of your gold, as the witch and all of your possessions are split between Bloth and I for our ransacking comfort. Very well, the first...Man...to make his hit on the chest wins the game. Remember you have two arms and I have only one." Mantus met Ren's steel with the Maelstrom break to signal the start of the duel.

Ren flipped and weaved to remove himself from a fatal collision. He swept the dynamic cutlass just enough to sway it from striking him and then he ran. Mantus launched at the obliging lad with not only the efficacy to back up his bluff but the inclement desire to cut and humiliate. The Maelstrom loyalist was playing for real but Ren could find fleetness capable of thwarting Mantus's lunges by swaddling about the various concealments in the garden, thus rendering his foe's position useless by arranging in any stoop which he could not be hit. Though the commander was abrupt, Ren was agile and could see Mantus use up a lot more energy than if he would remain static. He closed in on the brink, the tip of Tula's scimitar brushed by the cloth raiment. "Are you sure you're not the boy between us, Mantus?" Ren questioned and toilsomely fumbled to a sprint.

"I find it interesting what poor dedication you have, Ren. I want nothing more than to spoil your pathetic word with my definite victory." The gold-monger saw it easy enough to laugh in his own favor but Mantus could not ignore the reality that somehow, he was being slowed. Ren was fighting with purpose while he was solid on winning the game, a tap speared his chest and Ren did not call him on his slip. Perhaps the boy hadn't even seen the sharp end hit the mark underneath his right sleeve but there were no rules against shrouding a missed nick with Ren's naivety, he pressed a tight shoulder to his scratched torso. With a winding chase he narrowed the free distance in the panorama and propelled throughout to corner his prey.

Ren struggled with a cross against a raw wreck of metal that embodied all the potency of a bulldozing dagron. Mantus bore down with torrential chops on Ren until he could no longer resist the cyclone of his clean-cut violence. Shoving with all his strength on the boy who would not give in, the sneerer fixed a fine-tune of his angle. The blinding glint from the Black Sun off the reflection in Mantus's sword curbed Ren from making his second clip. "So you concede defeat, Son of Primus." Mantus clapped him in the ribs, a sleek surface airily touched just enough to be triumphant.

"Mantus. I'll do what you want. Please, don't hurt Ren." The numbed woman begged with a silent pang that should have crashed the falsifier in his tracks but Mantus only feasted with hungry greed at Tula's sacrifice.

He didn't understand how it happened so quickly. He had fought with everything within him, his and Tula's life at stake, the world's. His only hope of motivation to continue was aghast, the surreal mark of his shell-bound face would not erase. How would he deserve to survive this, it was impossible. Dejectedly, Ren knew he had lost and there was nothing he could do except give his own life to stop Mantus. To free himself from the guilt that would tear hairs of devotion from his soul one-by-one, but he could not even do that. "You may have won, but for all the wrong reasons and you won't get away with it." Ren crumpled in turmoil. He could accept the unfairness the swordsmaster dealt him, but any morale to go on left his transfixed core.

"Don't tell me you're a sore loser, boy. It is these competitions that separate the boys from the men. At least you didn't fight your inevitable fate, otherwise this unexplored flora may have became impatient for my comfort and put herself in harm's way. We'll just store her somewhere more secure while you hand over that Treasure of yours, and reveal those invaluable secrets you won't be needing." The conquerer announced his start toward the prize. Tula's dithering hand slunk for her broken comrade as Mantus's dash stopped to rustle the dust where she sprawl. He slid an arm under back like she were a bride and then hitched her over his shoulders to fetch her past.

"Mantus cheated, and I saw 'him. Make him raise his right arm." The hushed breeze shattered by a masculine slur.

"Let's see it." Ren readily rose from his sulking slump with a mettle revived. Mantus stretched the torn shoulder to the sky under a guise of cold calmness and the tucked-in slit in his empty silk was real. The earlier coins seen by both Ren and Zoolie as Mantus loaded up the inside of his stuffed sleeve now dribbled out from the limbless garb.

"You're a jitatan fool, Mantus, I would've thought you knew better after all this time. My eye for cheaters doesn't miss a mark. It's my job, ye know." Zoolie cozily pointed to a rich puff of cheeks.

"I've bested you in the rules of your own game!" Ren proudly declared his true victory, grinding edges to the seizing second, who had pulled the empty fabric over his detached elbow to mask the wound.

"Guess how much more my worth is than this shifter is worth without Bloth's one-coin-shy-of-a-billion?" Mantus hardly fidgeted in his loss but Zoolie's score seemed not to be satisfied, even after he had ousted the second-in-command for cheating. "Try..." The low hand crimpled in the twinge of a trying bend, he flipped one piece of fake gold. "Remember who the real man is, Ren." Zoolie delivered a helpful reminder.

"Thanks a billion!" Ren scooped the piece from the dust and flattened it on his front, he stood to face up to fears and arrange his shortcomings skillfully. Mantus silenced Zoolie once again with a mere pellet from more of the petrifying potion.

"Even though I cheated I still would have won, even if I did fairly lose. There is no fairness on the twenty seas, tadpole, and I am the greatest cheater of them all. That is why I will be the only pirate to ascend Bloth." Mantus's pace crept independently set for a butchering, and even with a caprice watch controlled at Ren his hellish will was fated for payment.

"I would have cheated you first, so that makes us equal. You were going to buy the Maelstrom off of Bloth with a piece of gold added to his endless collection, rather than take your chances in going against the evil man you crew for, who tricked you into folding all of your gold to him instead. Why is your despise on me, Bloth is who makes you miserable!" Ren argued in a row of meaning. He did not abandon predicaments impulsively, even in the streak of a berserk daze.

"Ren, you barnacle-brainless youth, did you really think I would stay under Bloth's control indefinitely? The moment he takes the Treasure and the lifeless savior of Octopian is powerlessly rotting in a grave of dark water, I will trick him out of it and he will join your eternal misfortune! I'll take, and do as I please as the richest man on Mer!" He callously amused himself, tactfully forcing Ren's ankle to submerge in a tripping gully of sand.

"Find something else to fight for! And stop it for him! Your alliance is temporary. You may have Bloth's protection right now..." Seeing the disaster approaching from behind him, Ren had apparently struck a nerve and tried to use it to his advantage, to break through to senses. Efforts useless, he meagerly stalled Mantus's unyielding attack.

"Bloth, is threatening maybe, but not superior. Bloated clods like him never see it coming, he never will outwit me! How do you think I made him do my biding all this time, by pleading with him to let me defraud the deserving and worthless like you?" Mantus deceitfully hissed, coldly bragging as his ruthless boss could not hear him. He pressed to slash at Ren, further backing the prince toward a dredge of dark water.

The Treasure pulsated in Ren's hand. His eyes then drew massive with consciousness. "So you thwarted his best efforts. Yet, you didn't have to rule under Bloth's kingdom! You never needed to deal for him, or fight for him. You let your greed control you. Is it because only you could help Bloth with that Treasure map, so you conveniently drop everything left after his ultimatum? How senselessly cruel to cover your tracks. You finally figured out the Truth, but now it's too late. I know hate me because Octopon would have suffered the same corrupt fate as Qui-Qua if I made the decision to be like you. The deceiver was indeed, deceived. Isn't that right, now Evil Tikla Mantus? Former, Tikla of Qui-Qua." Ren proclaimed with absolute certainty. "It's ironic and pitiful what you've let yourself become, polluted by your only advocate." He wistfully condoled.

"You know nothing at all, Octopian rat! You will never know what it's like to lose all you have after being brushed underfoot and pushed aside! Insignificant slug, you're Heir to the Throne of Pests! Wretched Son of Primus, you were pampered all your days, jitata boy! Well, Good Prince Ren, you won't see the end to your Quest. You will die, now!" Mantus scathed horribly, dangerously unamused. Ren watched the insidious commander sneer and disastrously cackle. After a frightening grunt, Ren saw the blackhearted crook assume the same deadly combat-stance seen before Avagon was purged from Bloth's dead ship.

"So, why didn't you try to leave? Was it worth not having to face up to the errors of your past? Mantus, please listen to me. Just for what I have to say. I know how tough you are, you've made it quite clear." Ren realized his mistake in reviving bad memories and threw out his hands, the distant hint from a forgotten dream of kayra-din told by Tula rushed his mind. His abandonment of the Sword when it should have been by his side may have gotten him into this mess as Soosa of the Imbibers had warned but he sincerely subdued his posture, knowing he would only have one shot at this. The riled aggressor quelled ineptly, still prepared to unleash carnage with a raised slicer.

"Your petty lecture is useless! kayra-din should have fully obeyed my orders, then at least she would have earned a more dignified death! Only that woman was capable of stealing from me! It was her kind and your King-" The Commander even admitted, disgracefully reminded.

"By the soul of Octopon I'm not lecturing you. If you grant me one request, I'll not only hand over the Treasure but I'll tell you how to use it. Bloth won't be able to stand against it either, you won't have to overthrow him yourself. So how about it, let's play a bet." Ren powerfully propositioned.

"Son of Primus, why would you make such a deal with me if you knew I already cheated you once? Could you be that desperate for another chance?" Mantus attentively drew in a chastised croak. This time his nerve was serious and skeptical.

"No. All I ask if I win is that you give my friends the antidote, and try to accept what I have to say for it." Ren skelped the blade Tula had given him out of viewline in the nappy thorns.

"We're dual opposites." Mantus dashed twice in a loop in anticipation to crack his counterpart's stratagem, flinches melted from his solid force for reckoning.

"That doesn't mean we can't relate." The prince froze until the commander had impatiently crossed ankles and huffed irritation.

The furtive tactician seemed to be considering, he returned to a more level persona. "And what request might you be betting on this time, worthless smool-rat?" Mantus furthermore sought, an interested standing played on his brow.

"Only that I can see a reflection of myself in your sword, and that you give me your opinion." Ren kindly struck his bargain, choosing his words with the utmost and painstaking care. Mantus backed his rapier away.

The cutthroat broke into a mad howl. "You're willing to put your entire Quest in permanent ruin so you can see a reflection? This should be like giving lashes. Very well, Son of Primus, I accept your foolish wager. What is it you desire my opinion on?" The circumspect saboteur gave audience to the breakable boy. He tilted his blade in such a way that it would reflect Ren, who was in front of him. What he did not see was that his own image would also be shown on the opposite side. The righteous royal simultaneously pressed the Treasure against the metal.

"Look in your sword, do you see the reflection of a True Man that you fashion you are? Or someone macho in words and will only? How long has it been since you actually saw yourself? Are you happy with how they see you?" Ren composed a valuable appraisal. Mantus honored Ren's request and looked, out of the sheer will that he would be victor.

"Foolish Ren, no one gets the antidote, they will do my bidding forev-What?!" Mantus was horrified by the shriveled and frail dirty-old-pirate, ultimately terrifying and vicious to a pinnacle and not at all the muscular desire he expected to see. "You! You'll pay for this!" The sore loser grunted and moved in for the kill. Ren bounded from the exacting swipe with all his momentum, Mantus would groan and roar but Ren knew it wouldn't hide his visible tear from view. "You don't believe me but I had looks! I had money! I had women lining up to be in my company! I was beautiful once, I was like you!" He sourly brayed, once more attempting to deflect the honest prince into the melanoid demise but Ren skid upon the silt. The two majestic Sons battled until the fiendish disarmed the benevolent and sunk his only defense in the rapacious flow.

"You're the only one who made you who you are, I know that toughness was only a necessary front for you. Slow down...Saytasi was trying to help you, the way Tula helps myself and Ioz but you didn't trust her. I could say I'm more responsible than you were, but Zoolie was wrong. You are a man, one who has fallen in his way and I'll help you too...if we get out of here in one piece!" Ren wittingly discoursed by Mantus, who was helplessly bound to the image of a hideous monster with blood-minced claws and ruined teeth. He teetered on the ebb, seeking to back up but the prince's foot slipped and crunched on a bone. He toilsomely cursed, trying not to think of the significance of why that had been there to begin with. Ren observed the outraged slayer aiming for an instantaneous end to his life as his sight met with the profane glare.

"I'm sick of you!" Mantus bellowed in a screech turned sour. In the likeness of a total nightmare from Ren's imagination, a pair of arms sprouted from the swordsman's scanty midsection. The blue orbs of his eyes grew several times larger along with his skull, which morphed from an oblong cone to a full-armored cranium to fit a humanoid-mantid of? double his height and weight. Mantus's flint hairy became like protective spines on the back of his emerging thorax while the quills under his nose stretched into antennae. Clawed fingers mutated into predatory pincers on the Draconik's extended arms, the flowing elbows on his garment now wrapped his broadened shoulders in entirety and allowed chitin spikes to easily peek through. "I am a man? Say that now, runt!" Two barbed feelers locked Ren stiff and subtle, bearing over a screak of an insect.

"You're a...carnivore." With pupils dilated Ren twisted at the gray and black mantis that had replaced the skinny merling of the sea-dragon race.

"Now you know the secret of my final and truly toxic form! Eel-blood is deadly, but it does nothing to what my poison will do to you. You see, due to a genetic anomaly in my Draconik body I can readily become what you see and unfortunately, I cannot assume my monster state ordinarily...or I would prevent my own death. You see, I was pure-bred. See how my quills are full? They grew on time, I amwas? the last of my race who can transform into the water-mantises our people are-until those Valjen eels dumped their spores into Qui-Qua's grove! Bloth only allowed me to seek women at port when he wanted a lot done...because I transform into this when I catch them. For I need the touch of a beautiful woman to become the towering insect I am. I found a way around it to extract the essence of any creature so I can become the mighty deformity you see in front of you...I swallowed the potion made from the blood of the lighthousekeeper as well as that terrible sister of yours...but this isn't as fun as that magic-wench doing the trick for me and her." Mantis ground his bloodied claws for a sweating prey.

"So now it all makes sense...you're that creature." Ren stopped cold inside the fiend's grip, soon mistaken and horrified by what he had seen.

"Creature? Yes, and now you are nothing more than waste! I do not produce the venomous blood-plasma naturally but the pulses inside my insect body make the oil from my thorax toxic to all life. It only takes a mere drop of my mist to make them wither and squirm to a slow death. Ask that woman about your father's Sorcerer, Kauldron, he adapted well enough after my own serum found it's way to his innards. I disposed of your friend Zoolie's wench, Kayraadin, and she was delicious even before I devoured her! I hope you understand this size is very hard to maintain...so I need excessive nourishment to remain stable." With sight as a radar Mantis craned his pleated thorax to inspect the morsel between a pair of regrown tarsus.

"You might think your pure-bred state is a blessing but it actually is your curse. You may be a mantis on the outside but can't you see you're empty on the inside? I'll bet if you were born like the rest of your people you wouldn't be so angry. Don't tell me you still think Saytai was trying to take your birthright from Phorlock, neither one of them betrayed you. I'm warning you...you'll be in trouble if you think of me as a snack." Ren gulped as he could hardly buck inside the chiton spokes but he only produced a weak and sweltering effort to repel.

"I haven't bitten into a savory human for twelve years. When I drain that Treasure of Rule out of your screaming carcass your limbs will provide me with the fresh nutrients I've long hungered for, it's not often I get to feast on living prey that isn't expired. It's too bad I'm on Lord Bloth's time so I can't show you the introduction to my cauterizing stinger." Mantis sheared his mandible at a young meal as he pinched the vial containing the liquefied Treasure. He had spent his whole adult life seeking the Treasures of Rule, growing into a bitter man. His ultimate ambition was to make the trade with Bloth, to buy his kingdom or buy the Maelstrom. The means would of course justify his righteous end, as Zuuror he would wipe clean every future generation of the Valjen people in the name of Qui-Qua and for the better good. All he needed were the Treasures. "Nice muscle tone. I'll eat your stomach!" While Ren had given up the toll of splitting loose, Mantis chomped for his delectable prey.

"I know you imagine what your life would be like if you hadn't left home. Back then you'd have everything you wanted and more, if you had only waited and compromised. Even if you were born to kill you don't have to resign yourself to it. You're a man, not a monster-!" Ren kicked his feet at the lethal jaws, he wailed when a barb lightly pricked the frail cloth of his tunic but Mantis trembled at Bloth's fearsome scorn in the distance. Freakishly, the giant mutant shrunk and Mantus seized Ren at a bleak path.

"Bloth will know the River of Rule is alive in you, like he knew about the Oracle of Aymara. The River of Toishuok vanished from my island after it gave Birth to the Compass of Rule but Bloth didn't know where to look for it. He couldn't find it in the caves of Arakna island with the map, not knowing it was underneath. Now you'll be cursed because he'll steal the last River with a page from the Scroll, like Kauldron stole this drop from you!" In an instant Mantus yowled as he stabbed a sharp brand at Ren, who needed to fall over to prevent the contact of dark water from rolling in harmony with the sawing sweeps.

Mantus collapsed to a stagger suddenly, the cold tears waxed beneath his cheek and trickled to a clammy flow. In the aftermath he was aghast by him he saw, yet...he could not escape this Curse the Dark Dweller placed on him. To be a living corpse was what Mantus was destined to be.

"Everyone I've loved...I've destroyed!...And I'm proud of it." Mantus reeked of verocity, and then choked on those innards that swallowed from the dreariest reaches.

The scavenger remembered the many moons of his youth in this suffocating asylmn where Mantus was to stay and would exist for the rest of his time, chained in darkness for all eternity. Though he wheezed with nothing but impoverishment those coils of black blood constricted his midsection so only the sad eyes of a little insectoid peered through. In this silent prison he was not allowed to move or breathe, inside the very heart of the Dark Dweller.

"He sent me in his place to live an empty life! Do you know what it feels like being alive in body only." Mantus spat to Ren's horrified sympathy, he had traded his birthright for plunderage.

"That's terrible. Why didn't you mention this earlier?" Ren felt the hideous cries of the miscreation.

"Because there's no escaping him!" Ren read the sorrow present in the cutthroat's body, the trauma of when he had been transformed into the worst kind of dark disciple. Saytai had caught the plague when she was nine and after searching endlessly he found the gleam from a Treasure was the only cure. Like? Morpho he formed a pact with the Dark Dweller to extract the serum for her release but then found anger with her for feeling that force, so that soulless nightmare forged every path he encountered. Let out with the eternal pact to perform every evil task for the overlord was the only reason he had been brought into existence.

The lad was sad not for the tides of catastrophe the swindler endured, but because he didn't believe the Treasures could save him.

"I have no heart! I'm a soulless beast!" The rapscallion fell in the wind, crushed by the gripping impingement that he was once Ren's preddessessor.

"Do you realize how much Bloth really knows? Think about to whom the Maelstrom belongs before you take that risk on, I know he didn't bet on your bet. If you don't stop this right now, you won't even attain Kuunda's forgiveness. Or that of the Protectors of the North." Ren pleaded for resolve. One more strike would tumble him in. "What Scroll?" Ren fret as he caught the crowning Treasure in his hand, but the rickety commander grappled for it with a double-fisted grip. Both refused to let go. The disparaging scowl of odium forced itself at his face.

"Mantus! If you can't finish this moronic waste of a Royal pain, then I will!" Bloth's impatient imperative had evidently taken enough. The huge marauder stomped at the two figures and finally came to rest as he grabbed Ren by the throat and ripped the Treasure out of hand, holding the nobleman over the defiling toxin. "Mantus you conned me out of ten gold extra when I gave you your first ship's pay, I'll finish this rat if he is too robust for you to handle." Bloth grinned at his officer and ranted. The swordsman smiled victoriously.

"You don't think I would go with your going rate, did you Bloth?" Mantus successfully sneered with pretentiousness. "Let's destroy him!" He chanted with a bloodthirsty influence. He gleaned his cutlass on the prince to block Ren's only escape route.

What by the two moons of Mer had made these two so deranged, Ren did not try to fathom. "No! Bloth, you won't win!" Ren choked out a strained and imperiled refute at his enemy. He marked at Mantus by his side. If either one of them won, this world would be nothing but pain. "Neither will you! Kreld-eaters, you have no chance! Either of you thieves! You'll both die with everyone else!" He helplessly fought with last words, flailing his legs and clawing at Bloth's smothering hand with his dying energy.

"No!" Visible from the inner chamber, Tula wept. She and the courageous venturer next to her were pinned down by an intangible force. Fatigued eyes shut.

"Mantus!" Avadasia cannot change her name without the help of the Dark Dweller, even when she is transformed.

"Yes, say your dying words, Son of Primus. It looks like you have helped me whether you wanted to or not, inane boy." The heartless pirate captain smiled as he put away the newly-reconstructed Treasure of Rule. "Say goodbye, Ren!" He brandished his carving edge, planning to lance Ren into the conquering water of silence underfoot.

"I'll do the honors!" Mantus lashed a blade for Ren with an eradicating roar.

Ren surprised himself by jostling his nemesis to let him go, but he was still abandoned. Backing torturous dark water with two enemies surrounding him. No Treasure and no weapon had he holstered. Finished. Closing his eyes, he braced himself for the final blow and the end, not wanting to look. There was a clank and Ren's blue eyes drew up their lids.

"You too, Mantus?" One raw and authoritative phrase mumbled.

"Boy, he's the only one who is worse than me!" The stuttering wheeze could be heard next before it faded. "Bloth, you owe me this Treasure more than any dead-man's gold. You won't rot The Zuuror's Legacy, not like you did me. Ren won't let you take Say. You cheated me out of my life and my birthright, now I'll make certain shuskav's prediction is true. You're not subtle, Blue-lips." With a strategic spit in the eye, a blackhearted schemer rasped. "The Saqtie-star of Qui-Qua...she was the more capable option. She was more deserving of Qui-Qua than I, and should have taken my place. She was...not meant to suffer. The scroll's Seal is...?" Dejectedly he twisted the impeaching knife and at the concluding utterance, he buried the reminder to his humanity. Two dirtied flower petals from endless leagues North floated off the lean shoulder which had clung to him even in treachery, he averted to the One he should have been helping all along. kayraadin sunk into the dividing threshold with the warlord, holding on tight.

Ren saw the the sword of the commander holding off the massive blade above with trembling arms. Bloth, distracted and horrorstruck that the cutthroats' alliance broke as their two swords crossed under a casting shadow. The tyrant bolstered to raise the weapon once more. Ren was stuck frozen, beholding the second-in-command's crooked face, which fastened on him in harsh expression. If Mantus could speak in those ultimate moments left Ren knew the commander would hatefully call him the most brainless man on Mer, and for not running. Life restored to Ren's limbs when he listened to the metal clash against the same steel. He retracted at the swiftly plowing weapon that caused the unlit conartist to instantaneously become overwhelmed by violating catatonia. The epicenter provided a spring to Mantus's sailing cutlass, which Ren hastily proceeded to evade.

"Lord Bloth, pleasee! Mantus had been full aware of destiny but it obviously did not stop him from screaming woefully at the sight of his legs being devoured, ruefully crying out to his boss for a second chance as he lapsed to his end by the same corrupt man he pledged to serve. The good prince listened to his name called but once, at the very fulfillment of the insectoid's violation by the decays of evil. Ren just managed a glance at Mantus's disappearing skull being completely converged in black and the portion those rangy nails left as they forever stopped clawing for any security on the defiling surface, the remnants sinking in dark water.

"The number two has just left, boy! Now it's only you and me!" Bloth's demonic voice boomed over the grave plot. "It's your turn!" Precariously, he advanced after leaving his second-in-command to evil.


	17. Rebirth

Chapter 13 EPIC END PART 4

THE SPIRIT - THE CURSE

PART 4 REBIRTH

In a moment of attempted salvation, the stunned prince despairingly tried to grasp for the hand. Too late.

Ren scorched through the sand as agilely as viable, until he was captured by his leg. The cage of blue fingernails gripped around his ankle. The time and trick his former rival had bought him had been in vain. "Without me you'll never have want you want. You know that, Bloth! Noy jitata!" Ren achingly screamed, he found himself chucked legdeep in asphyxiating sludge as Bloth was enthralled with the harmful vision. Only a brief while had passed when Ren began to moan in agony, the dark water behaved as if it wished to disassemble him. He swiped away at Bloth's trunk of a foot, which was the only fixture he could reach for until it was pulled away. The bloated emperor scarcely reversed his motion, appearing to be throughly enjoying the cries of Ren's catastrophe.

"It's too bad, Ren! How close you were. If you had only shown a tougher skin, you could have run." Bloth leered and beget a detestable chuckle. "Consider yourself lucky I don't finish off your shipmates in front of you. How enticing it would be to further prolong your misery." He glared as he retired his words, lifting high the Treasure of Rule and letting it back down. He motioned as if he wished to swing away, the Treasure was at his side and in grabbing distance.

"Well, Bloth." Ren pressed out. "That makes a mistake on both of us!" Ren gritted with liquid eyes, straining with all his swelling potency until at last his hands clutched his saving grace. He clamped on to the ring with all his stamina, refusing to ever let go in a manner of solid obstinacy. He labored against the stabbing torture of his hands as the pallor fingers of his cruel foe were trying to pry his steel retention.

From behind Ren's enemy, a second oozing glob brought forth a binding tendril that attached to a beastly ankle and ripped Bloth from his standing. The dark water played tug-of-water with the contending opponents as the transcendent and final Treasure of Rule was the only thing that bound one of them from a suffering end. "Let go, boy! It's mine!" The corrosive order of the assailant struck Ren's ears.

"Never, Bloth!" The prince's return echoed within the four grand walls of the domain.

"You'll be fodder for dark water!" Bloth thundered, wrenching upon the gilded ring.

"I won't let you win!" Ren gustily exerted. Both grips on the halo held just as unshakable, despite the pain imbuing the racking bodies. Neither was able to free himself or the other.

"Then I guess we'll both go down!" Bloth lowly grunted. Ren remembered being in such a situation before, but not under this dark water.

"Ren!" The gracing sound rung from the muddy sky. The seeker of light bestowed a gander up and spied brilliant feathers, a blazing weapon dropped right near him from above.

"Noy jitat!" Bloth cursed.

"I'll have your back next time, Ioz! By Daven's beard I swear!" Ren called back through constricted breath to the sky. He let go of one hand on the Treasure and attempted to snag the glittering Sword Of Primus that had fallen. Bloth did the same and wrestled to belt it out of Ren's reach, but failed. Ren stretched with the remaining vigor he could summon against the gulping deluge. His digits wrapped around the handle of the Sword that glowed to his touch, he was forced to let go of the Treasure to claim the weapon. "You should be thanking me, Bloth. I'm your only way out of this jitatan death-pit." Ren quipped as he annexed the Sword with both of his shivering hands, and thrust the shinning blade into the bailing basin. He wafted to his feet, positioning in a combative stance.

"We'll see about that." Bloth angrily growled as he snatched the Treasure of Rule, which released him from the pressure of the dark water as the golden ring verged upon it. He rolled to stable ground, wielding and ready to strike. He was the first one to sway his hefty blade when Ren approached to reclaim the prize.

When Bloth attacked, Ren was not thrown back by his swing. The Sword Of Primus could have added to his strength superbly, as Bloth could slash at Ren but was unable to knock the young man over or bash the weapon out of his hands. Even more raw dynamism was behind Ren's sweep than that of Ioz's fully-armed blow. At long last, the mortal enemies were equally matched. "Give up the Treasure now, Bloth! Today we're changing destiny! Surrender and we'll finish this!" Ren screamed out a warcry as the rivals locked blades, circling each other like korba-cats in a fight. The breeze filled with the clatter of the burning flecks from the dueling match. Ren flipped about to the fringe of the destructive Captain's periphery, commencing to almost nail a perfect disarmament with a shock from sidelong.

"If you can take it from me!" Bloth roared out, bounding for Ren's throat. The battle that would be a fight to the death escalated as Bloth muscled Ren toward the dismal stream, perspiring with another shove. In wrath, he elevated the prince by the edge of the collar and prepared to shed the opposer with the terminality of his drained vehemence. Ren howled. "Now, boy! You're through!" Bloth tempestuously groaned out, from behind his foe he observed the surly pirate and a monkeybird jump onto the battlefield. He heard another clink against his side and screamed in furious rage as the Treasure made its way around Ren's extended arm via Sword. The heir had clipped himself down.

"Give it up, Bloth!" With a smirk Ren confidently taunted. He stirred another clack and effortlessly busted the golden-rimmed cutter out of the adversary's fist, launching it into blowing sands as he trekked splendidly forward. Bloth backed up, and too far into dark water. The mess crawled on his ankle and threatened to consume him as he wailed in terror. Ren felt a hand on his shoulder, Ioz gave him a smile of brethren.

"Well, Bloth, looks like you're in a dark place! No pun intended, you old sea-snake!" Ioz directly mocked from Ren's side. Ren's eyes wandered and glimpsed at another two figures emerging.

"Looks like Mantus wanted to take a swing at Bloth as much as the rest of us do. That and he flew too close to the sun, it's what happens when he doesn't take the time to claw through sand he already dug through." Zoolie commented smartly, paralyzing vapor worn off.

"These creatures detected us as one of their own because of the vapor that was used on us, so they released us. I guess Mantus made a mistake with his choice of location." Tula reposed by Zoolie's side, commenting on the Dexolor that were quite contented to simply nuzzle her palm.

"Don't worry about Jargis either, he won't be coming back." Niddler proudly proclaimed as Ioz nodded.

"Ren, let's go! We should get back to Avagon, I told Niddler to take Jenna to the fleet and Teron is still with them!" Tula shouted at her crewmate to go. "Ren!" She called to him again, he was not responding. Ioz knew the dark waves were flowing again too. The swarthy fighter opened his mouth to rush Ren, but the evil pirate had started to beg his comrade.

"Prince Ren! Help me!" Bloth choked aloud in a plea from the dark water absorbing him, he owned no Treasure and would have no way out.

Ren was more infuriated at the evil Lord than he had ever been. "Why?!" The golden-haired savior demanded, light-blue eyes full of intense ire.

"Ren, come on! We don't have time for this! The dark water..." Ioz tried to warn his friend by pulling his arm but Ren tugged him off, Ioz's upset gape returned.

"I don't intend to do you anymore harm! You have the Treasures of Rule, you are the one true ruler of Mer! I beg of you another chance! Son Of Primus..." Bloth groveled from the soldering gook he was sinking in fast due to size. He was only hanging onto the surface of the ground by his cold and pallid nails that were making raked trails in the dirt. Ren glowered amid grinding teeth.

"You tried to kill me and my friends! You killed my father, my mother and my brothers. You tried to kill the rest of my family! I swear on Kunda's soul my parents' sacrifice will not be in vain! Maybe you deserved a second chance back then, but after all you put us through! Ugh! Dark water is a horrible way to go..." Ren screamed at his arch-foe with contempt, a good heart only bridged so far. He saved the Leviathan-beast once before, to which the monster made him regret. Still, Ren was conflicted. "Fine, dartha-eel! By my Father's blood this is the last time I will save you! Only on the condition you help us vanquish the dark water." Ren generously declared, meaning it. He stomped toward the lagoon where Bloth was being pulled in to drown and thrust the Sword into the baneful darkness. The dark water fizzed, and Bloth was set free.

"Ren, no!" Tula tautly screamed to him, feasibly too late. The evildoer promptly wobbled up and off the ground with a cunning smile, he surmised to hurdle to the tunnel. It was then that the group on the battlefield listened to something slink from behind them. Heads snapped around as an outline arose from desecrating abomination. The six individuals focused on a thin-skinned man with sooty hair brandishing a rangy and curved sword. There was a malevolent grin on his face and his eyes were as black as the gloomiest voids, worn about his neck was a shrunken skull with a boiling substance inside.

"The Dark Dweller has need of you, Lord Bloth!" The nefarious but recognizable form hissed as all the eyes in the courtyard widened like that of a dagron.

"Mantus!" Bloth hollered, nearly floored in horror. He took off, tumbling down the passageway that led out of the cell Ren had burst through.

"Noy jitat! I don't want to stay to see the end result of this, Ren! Let's go!" Ioz hastily grabbed Ren by the arm and dragged him the same route Bloth had sprung.

"Jazhea and Say said there's a way out through this passageway, come on!" Tula shouted precariously to briskly incite and Niddler fluttered, following the group. On the way through the passageway, Ioz and Tula stopped to salvage their own weapons that the enemy had preempted from them via Ren's possession.

The exitway passed through canals underneath the palace, as the four of them ran, they could hear the yells and perhaps even saw some of the crew from Avagon's fleet marching through the labyrinth. The stairs ascending out of the underground chamber joined to a steep cliff. Down below, the frigate was steering off through an ocean of dark water.

"He still has the 12th Treasure!" With an adamant wheeze Ren exclaimed. Before he could act, he saw that the sable tide was coming to shore now and much of the armada was being forced to abandon ship. "Jenna!" He outcried and flurried with trepidation. "The seas have mercy..." He knew the black ruin could not breach the lighthouse, only then did he witness the whole dismay of forgotten nightmare awaiting him. The Maelstrom plowed through the dark water as if it had been given a whim in it's own will, at the helm was a recognizable presence blurred in eyesight. The noise from behind him drew nearer and the group observed that the Dark Disciple Mantus had followed them out and was slashing shiny murder at them, it met Ioz's weapon as the three of them attempted to split off.

Part 2 Before the Prince Was

"Thank my Master for this chance to destroy you again, Son of Primus! I knew you would be surprised by the Dark Dweller's illusion of The Surge!" Morpho cackled as he drove the Maelstrom to station directly behind the Wave. From over the mainmast hovered a coal monster, and by the dark-disciple's side were legions of sea-worn pirates bearing overgrown beards, who in all ways were still in the realm of the living. The hull floated in the superb condition and course Kauldron had directed magically, the deadly spines of the beastly ship were coated in algae but otherwise unharmed by the false wreckage.

"Go Ren! I'll hold them off, get to Bloth's stolen-ship with Tula and Niddler!" Ioz shouted his ploy as he stormed at the demonic convert and curbed any chance of encounter. "Ready Zoolie?" He called to his proximate companion.

"You bet, Ioz! Ready as a scuttling scurvy-dog!" Zoolie vehemently answered back as he pumped a jubilant arm and started to rend at the fiend.

"But, Ioz. Zoolie-" Ren protested with a caring grace, inspecting the bleak bounds of the predicament. The portion of pure surf had begun to rapidly cover at the outflow of Bloth's tracks.

"Go!" Ioz yelled out again as he gird his sword and beat the fanatical commander down on back with a charge. Ren nodded and at last moved away.

"Ioz, why does Mantus have those cloying black-eyes? I've never seen him like that before!" Zoolie questioned, puzzled and perturbed.

"It means he's friends with fish-face, Zoolie!" Ioz shouted exuberantly as he rolled like a monkeybird-egg and kicked away dark disciple Mantus with his boots. "Chungo lungo!" He exclaimed excitedly.

"This is where Jargis was! We should be able to use Slaggon's device to go after him, as much as I hate the idea." Niddler flapped down to land and pattered to Ren and Tula, who secured the plot on the cliff where the butterfly-glider hung.

"Great, it will be effortless to glide across the waves this way. Niddler, can you give us a boost?" Ren entreated the monkeybird, he hoisted up the demolished machine with Tula's aid and the two pilots chased forward with a running start. Niddler glided to the tail, duly clenching his paws on the splinted rudder as he floated down on his wings and swooped.

"Ren. There's something in the water, over there!" Tula alerted from the speeding gust, her eyes strew on a lilac bulge in the sludge.

"Niddler, take us down!" Ren issued the affirmative order, the craft zoomed down to skim the water. Ren withdrew the Sword, clearing with the magical gem he held in his grasp a path in the dismal plane to be utilized by Ioz and Zoolie. The deadly gum opened for anything else ensnared, out of the depths grew a towering monolith of scale and fin. The full-grown leviathan confronted Tula as the sail ruffled back up to the air. It shook Tula from her place and padded her on a back of plate, the head swerved around and gazed with a recognizing stare.

"Ren, it's Baby!" Tula informed the close and swishing skipper.

"Baby isn't a baby any more!" Niddler squawked, he fluttered the rudder away from the pair.

"You can join us at rendezvous, I know you have it under control! You're in good hands!" Ren called after, confident and effortlessly pivoting away to cast for Bloth's vessel. Tula fiercely held to the durable hide. Something aphotic drifted down from the rushing wind, her head began to pound and swell with a smarting. She veered up at the afflicting inception. "Not Kerroptus!" She malignly fazed out.

"The Dark Dweller will show mercy to none! Aahahahahaaaa!" Atop the monster, a zealot surmounted. "Bow before your Master!" Morpho withdrew a pistol at Tula with an frenzied gurgle. The ecomancer bolted away from a shooting stream of jet slime. She collapsed on the ridging skin of the cetacean, stricken by nothing more than the occupancy of contamination. Baby bellowed.

"Thank the Dark Dweller for reuniting me with my true potential!" Kerroptus retched a sublime flaunt.

On the peak of a cliff, sliver flashed. Two contenders frayed at a brutal crony.

"Stalagor? That name is hardly ever used. They call it Valjen now. Ren said something to me before about that, The Surge. Supposedly it caused the Black Tide, from the lore I've heard. Not that it matters, no one who would know is still alive. But if you knew anything about it at all, it would be useless. It's just a myth." Ioz somersaulted, throwing a wrench into the extremist's maneuver as he conversed.

"That's like what Commander Vunk said." Zoolie sedately acknowledged with an ambition to disable the reborn Mantus. He carted the cadaver up, restraining the gnarling and worming torso. "These fellas are a step down! Should be no leviathan-toss to take out the rest of these bozos." He ragged on and discarded Dark Disciple Mantus. He then pat his hands clean.

"What did he say?" Ioz rushed, snapping around.

"Something like your tale. I don't know, I never knew that guy very well. Other than he got lucky when Ol' Drakkle became rich and retired, he wanted that fellow away like a sea-plague." Zoolie returned with a crane of his neck while the undead Mantus lumbered from a sprawled weak-point. He instantly bat the minion back to submission.

"What about piglet?" Ioz skeptically questioned, projecting an inquisitive stare. "That sneaky runt knew how to secure better than midshipman, I never would have loaned that gantha-pig anything. Even if Chungo-case did put him up to it." He stably commented, he subdued his posture.

"Konk wouldn't remember. He wasn't around then, and I was feeling generous when I let Konk steal to get good blab. Darva-worm couldn't have tricked me out of a scraped drabul if he 'had the brains to." Zoolie reflected, replying with a tentative ear. "You know, ever since we swam back to Octopon and went our separate ways, I've missed all the action. Thinking of maybe putting in a no-holds-barred arena in the gamehouse." He playfully mused, standing straight.

"Seriously, Zoolie. By Ebron's mainsail you certainly do get bored easily, I would have thought you've seen enough of old adventures to last you a denbar reef-roll. We still have another Treasure left to recover." Ioz peered at the mountain-of-a-man in something of distaste.

"What's wrong with a little entertainment? As for this fellow..." Zoolie scraped up the antsy disciple by the regalia with a whisper. "I should have know it earlier Z.M.Q was the Shanken, Ebronian legend. The mantis God, these ears heard about his followers bringing him offerings of beetles. It's a hybrid of a giant sea-mantis and a water-dragon, it steals women then loots them of their gold and jewelry. Sounds like our friend, eh? I see now why my local Denizens thought Z.M.Q. was here with that tattoo he bears. Sometimes when Bloth wanted someone gotten rid of off his ship he'd send Mantus and they would blame it on Z.M.Q., The Polar Prince who is in cohoots with Z.M.Q. was a big deal at the time because no one knew who he was. Z.M.Q. scares his targets, he doesn't take anything but he leaves sixteen gold pieces behind. Then they are approached by a man who speaks in broken Common and says their relatives are in the same danger but his boss, the Polar Prince, will help them out by loaning them a portion of his million drabuls if they pay him seventeen pieces of gold to have it shipped to 4-1-9 Janda-town. Sure enough, Z.M.Q. left them alone." He bolted an interested brow to the betting-man.

"Mantus...Z.M.Q. Kuunda's mercy, but then he was in two places at once in the whirlpool of dark water almost swallowed Solia and I whole?!" Ioz's pupils blanched in disbelief as everything unknown spiraled into stomach-souring daunt. Under the tip of his eyelid he could see the Maelstrom closing in, even through the crashing of living sludge from the center of Mer.

"I don't think it was him, mate. That's not all, Zuuror Phorlock of Qui-Qua. Our friend is, or was, the Son of Emperor Phorlock. I'm sure like a tempest." Zoolie boldly professed.

"Phorlock. Primus's knight?" Ioz examined with a fidget of his chin.

"Aye, him. Same fellow who escaped from the Maelstrom that time Mantus was away from his command post, might have come into interaction with Mizar too while he was there but he was a king who vanished before all that. Quin people only found an empty vial in his disappearance and didn't know what to make of it. The Zuuror's palace was bigger than King Primus's before it fell, and they couldn't find him in the rubble. I remember hearing about it before I set sail, and Mantus was recruited only on an obscure moonrise after I was." Zoolie resolved rather evenly.

"How do you know this?" The brawnier of the two wondered.

"World history, of course. They teach it in the prime Ebronian-halls." Zoolie granted his easy source. "Anyway, you weren't there when Bloth wanted to destroy Qui-Qua so he could pick off of it. That he did, picked it clean and took everything. Except, he obtained a league of Valjen ships from a previous raid and used them instead of his own. It was a preemptive strike and a brilliant tactical-maneuver on 'is part, Quin wouldn't hunt him down and he successfully destroyed any current peace treaty between the North Pole and the South for further raids. Some swear he did the same on Biperia with the two cultures there as well." He elaborated with starch detail.

"Well, all's well that ends well." Ioz calmly sighed. "Ahoy, fate of Kisma. Cargo-boating in Tayhoj is a midnight-monsoon worse than what His Nobility of the second-wealthiest nation on Mer put himself through. The son of a seadog gets what he deserves." He contemptuously scorned.

"With all due respect Ioz, you weren't around when Bloth first recruited this fellow to see what kind of initiation they gave him. Maelstrom men don't like spoiled pretty-boys who can buy anything they want. They think they don't know how to fight, and Mantus didn't buy his board. It would be like if Ren joined Bloth." Zoolie judiciously empathized, to Ioz's evoked surprise. "Dirt-poor pup of fifteen who threw himself overboard to save his heartthrob's skin and jewelry as well as her first-mate got all the attention and friends. For me too even with a good upbringing, it was boring doing hard work for my greedy old-man from my home to only pay me in pennies and promises. This skip's tough for sure, only difference between myself an' Mantus is that I wasn't a complete jerk about it. Plus me' Gamehouse in Janda-town is true-as-blue all I want!" He concluded as the dark-blood thrashed and punched, so he returned him to the ground. "There's a break!" Hurrying out, he watched as the cloaking mire opened to reveal the sweeping ocean abundance.

"See you, old salt!" Ioz saluted with a charming grin as devotee Mantus growled and cursed on hands and knees by his fallen sword. He spun a versatile curve and dove into the free waves.

The parasitic murk loomed, crashing away from a single ship. The nearby sea monster could be seen stroking in the refuge of the diminished foam.

Ren and Niddler skidded to the frigate known as the Wave. When Ren and the monkeybird arrived at the refuge, they found it being overrun by dark disciples. Ren hacked at the invaders with his blade and they dwindled from it's power, yielding in recession. He glanced about and by way of the board, witnessing the form of the lavish-maned pirate and the bartender swimming through the drench, dark water swirled on the line from behind. Ioz climbed aboard.

"Where's Tula?" Ioz floundered, he wheeled about for the vanished crew. Zoolie mounted from the starboard. "Tula!" Ioz and Ren synchronically outcried, having spied an appalling picture taking place on the back of a leviathan.

"Ren! Ioz! Kerroptus has done something, watch out!" Tula warned with her own dread. She swayed on Baby's protective skin, the dull ache in her temples heightened. Her sight seized the dual horned-beasts of charcoal. Doublevision flickered for an aged moment as Kerroptus made an airborne swerve but Tula slipped, scantily producing a snug embrace around the leviathan's girth. She ineffectually screamed, her vision clouded out the befouling dregs of misery over the inferior plane. Her consciousness faltered. Her hearing screeched with a roar, the ringing of her eardrums was almost enough to completely pass her into an incapacity. Vitality restored her essence and she could creak her eyes. Baby clout Morpho and Kerroptus an orbit away, both sinking in grisly liquid. Someone else had come to her aid.

"Tula!" The ecomancer hearkened to a cry from the waterfront. "You are unskilled! Stay away from Kerroptus for as long as you can!" Teron roused with an instruction of imparted wisdom, barely visible as his voice magnified.

Tula slowly nodded, sweat dribbled from her abrupt chin. She scanned the fleeing enemy underneath, from the dark water fanatics were crawling up the verge of the swimming vehicle. "No!" Tula asserted. She fought to shift to her shaking feet, energy flow no longer compressed. "Have to do something..." She whispered as the wind began to whip in aberrant angles, eventually convening on a conjured target. Sizzles and booms sounded as the sky lighted up. Thunder pummeled and lightning flashed down in spots, hitting many of the mark and crackling them back into the weighty plague. "Baby, thanks so much for the help!" Tula beamed as she congratulated the sympathetic acquaintance, hugging the armor of the serpent. Baby placed an astronomic facade to greet her vision, gifting the lustrous ecomancer a heartwarming bray. Tula chuckled. "I guess I didn't realize how strong my own powers truly were." She mused a surprised and modest claim of her own, she directed her optics to the sector where the duo of the atrocious creations had fallen. "But not enough..." She morbidly droned.

"Leave the girl! Get the Son Of Primus and the Treasure!" Morpho dictated from the depths of black beyond, inciting the beast out of the dregs. Kerroptus ascended the threshold of sky and undoing.

Farther away, the Wave bobbed in the current as 'Her hull tangled the drifts to stay afloat. Three men and an avian gathered at the stern.

"Heroes! The slaves below will join our effort!" Climbing up from a nearby hatch, an elderly woman announced the procedure. Avagon ushered out of the hold many persons, old men and young women from Octopon or foreign countries poured topside and joined the clustering fortification. Sparking blue bolts flashed in the sky, smiting plenty an evildoer.

"I didn't know Tula could create lightning!" Ren dazzlingly awed, gazing at the magnificent enchantress of nature.

"It's a good thing she can because otherwise we would be completely swarmed!" Ioz truthfully reported, backpedaling from the horde of savage radicals scaling the bulwark. The leviathan swirled in the heavy sky as flares shattered down, swooping off another batch. The engagement eased and regrouped.

"Here ye go, miss." Zoolie efficaciously cheered, handing a small captive a weapon until Ioz nudged him.

"Guess who's back." Ioz pointed out to sea at the sight, both warriors gamboled to the berm. Dark Disciple Mantus had followed and was walking on dismal water, trying to pull the substance at Ioz with a commanding and outstretched hand. Bloth was screaming in the corner of the bow as brimming onyx-eyed worshipers were trying to attack, but he still clamped to the 12th Treasure of Rule so they would not come close. Konk and some other pirates were behind the Captain's back, cowering with makeshift devices.

"Look out below!" Tula, full of adrenaline, signaled from the brink of the heavens. In a spiraling flip, she tapped her toes onto the deck with a stupendous friend overhead. "Thanks so much for the help!" She bid the titan goodbye, Baby roared in departure. Tula stroked his scaly beak, then joined the troop of support. "Ay jitata! Let's go kick some dark disciple rudder!" The exuberant ecomancer called to arms with complete exhilaration. Avagon and crew of the Wraith aligned with all of the captured souls taken aboard as plunder.

"Attack!" Avagon wrought the cry for revolution, zooming forward with a familiar escort bearing a golden ring in her nose.

"Ready? Charge!" Ioz eagerly clamored, leading the stampede forward as the tremendous battle broke out. Avagon and the prisoners were the first to begin beating the freaks off the rim. Weapons slashed and crashed, numerous smacks and yells were heard as disciples slapped the ocean of ebony. Ioz charged through the assembly, sword cleaved straight.

Ren and Niddler dashed and spun about. "Every one of you needs to lighten up!" Niddler rallied with a loud screech. The monkeybird divebombed a few choice selections from the airway, picking up and dropping the invaders off the ship or mauling with an elongated club. He helped to clear the path for the rest of the faction and Ren, who was prancing into the struggle with a shining weapon that the enemies instantaneously shrunk away from. With a friendly smile, the prince vaulted the band atop his crest to Niddler for air-defense.

"This isn't your world, unsightly slime!" Tula infuriatedly blared as she rammed streams of florid energy down from the staid ambiance. She halted the opposition with blasts like bombs in the water. Forcefully, she kicked through the flock and busted away more of the contention by foot and fist.

Avagon clashed against a foe, wielding a narrow broadsword. She finished it off with a knee to the gut and made haste for another dingy maniac. From behind a mast, two different macabre villains slithered forward and blocked her exit by way of the edge of the boat. Her face bravely calcified, but then gleamed.

"If you want to challenge Avagon..." The voice quickly chased. "You must wait your turn!" The woman with the nose ring told them straight up. From the bridge she flung free of the fanatical deformities, knocking them over the railing and into the tide. She dusted off her hands.

"By Daven's beard, these jesters are flopping like carnival stout!" Zoolie brightly trumpeted from rolling away a few of the nasty black-bloods. "Oh tell me ye don't think you can sneak up from there!" He joked with a wily grin as he heaved a keg, conking a rising mutant on the illy-formed forehead. "That's more like it, show me yer tipsy feelers ye eel-pads!" He chuckled and smashed more aleless canisters at the incoming ripple. He obtained an offhand weapon and lobbed it to a nearby heroine of Avagon's released. "Here ye go!" He gleaned beneficially. "Not again. Ioz, he's all yours!" He casually advised his fellow troublemaker to turn about. The pursuing and scrawny zealot glittered a razor that Zoolie smoothly hampered.

"I'll throw you off by your fancy shoes!" Ioz loudly ceased bouncing dragon-bolts off of mindless apostles and grabbed Dark Mantus by the ankles, whirling around for good measure and sent the decrepit slaughterer sailing overboard. "Chungo lungo!" He shouted restlessly, flailing from a nearby rope to face the free-for-all.

Avagon attempted to go after Bloth. She leapt over a few scrimpy marauders in the line and tumbled to jolt a blade with the Pirate Lord, being at a strategic advantage of having one arm of the enemy disabled. Bloth grunted and unwillingly engaged the nuisance. "Hand the Treasure over!" Avagon mercilessly directed with uninhibited will. "Milinda, secure port!" Avagon commanded, a nod granted from her pierced aide following. She had been walloped to the flat by the giant.

"Avagon, be careful!" Ioz blustered in, rushing to aid the elder. He sliced a strike with the ogre. "Give it up Bloth, if you don't want to become decking-waste!" He callously demanded, with Zoolie galloping after him. The mass of dark minions were prowling up the hull, disconsolately invincible. Avagon reemerged.

Not bobbing far off, a skirting craft from Avagon's fleet survived in the shadow of the Wave. Noise and racket ruffled from it's fringe.

"Eight! I'd say that was an eight!" The first pastel resident bestowed his praise with a slat above his head reading a painted Eight.

"Eight? No way! That was a six at best! The end is nigh!" Next to the prior, a florid inhabitant squabbled as he witnessed a negative sorcerer fly away from the ledge of the ship of turmoil and graded with the said digit.

"I don't know, I think that was at least a seven." The more sophisticated acclaim rung of argument, it's showy bearer raised up a sign with a seven boldfaced on the front.

"Kreld-eating smool-brain!" The gruff screech accompanied the bevy, a dagron-tailed bird fluffed it's wings.

"Where is your Queen? We should be assisting in any way we can." Jenna peeked around her at the sea of howling and hooting monkeybirds with a lurid disparagement. Feathers continued to percolate over her garnet hair on the crammed vessel as the winged simians about her continued to take advantage of the mixed drinks from the deck's openbar and root every time a cultist was flown.

"Stop holding up cards and help us!" Suddenly, Ioz's crass and desperate petition tolled out from the overrun barge. The avians froze, a tiny primate in the crowd lowered his wings and shifted downward a fixture inscribed with Go Ren. The hoots and screeches reoccurred.

"Your majesty, if I may, how did we end up on a ship full of monkeybirds?" With a bland inquest, an afro-donned albino approached the subject of his guard.

"Does that matter right now, Sorken?" The imperial King of the Pale Warriors calmly diverted from the peculiar liability of happenstance.

"What do we do, my Liege?" The stagnant vassal sought further suggestion.

"As King Obrik, and Lord of the Antari, I decree we stop holding up cards and help them." With a vow to his chest, Obrik sufficiently swore to send in the monkeybirds.

"That is a good way to get things done, your majesty. Everyone, suit up!" The attendant easily concurred and lifted a commanding arm to the multitude of able-bodied flyers.

"Awww." The lackadaisical monkeybirds sadly put down their team-spirit tablets and geared up with helmets and armor fit for the flying species, they belted throaty war-calls as they lifted into the heights with spears and maces. Soaring from atop the frigate, they dug claws into a band of murderers from the wicked water and trashed them into the same bilge.

"Stop sharking me!" Yelps of distress rabbled from the rampant current.

"My Liege, I see sharks, lots of sharks!" The naval commander of the Antari scouted through the periscope, reporting his find to the king.

"Obrik, seeking permission to come aboard!" Out of the available patch of undimmed aquamarine, a sharklike beast surfaced within spread as one affiliate invoked. The maw of the capacious bottomdweller opened and out pad two men.

"Permission granted!" King Obrik soundly responded with a fleck of red eyes and the signal of an inviting palm from the helm of the secondary base. Loren and a visitor stepped forward out of the sharkemsub and mounted the hull to the warclipper as the natural-transport sunk quickly.

"Kyn and myself would like to be taken to Avagon!" Loren did not delay when he heeded the royalty's support.

"Done but there's only one way there! It's safer for the both of you to stay here, they don't need more assistance currently!" Obrik advised as he gestured to the sky. The sable bursts were ripping and yawing, on the decline they swallowed some of the lazy monkeybirds that dove too near.

"We'll take it! They do need us!" In consequence, Kyn obliged with the King's only option. The nearby pair of winged aides swooped through a twister of winds to uplift Loren and Kyn to ride them to the Wave. The boots of the protectors tapped down on the planking.

"By the Trust of Myelkah and Toishuok, the Lifeblood of the North, I wield your vitality to save these lives!" Kyn mobilized with an enchantment from his power scythe. Blasts of water and a spate of algae from the surface of the brine targeted and pelted a throng of enemies away.

"Loren!" Avagon greeted from the tight sidelines. "Kyn, where is your brother?" The wise woman challenged the absence of Kyn's usual counterpart.

"Iskjar didn't make it!" Kyn confessed with solemn limitation. "Loren, this is our last dance as Warriors of the Alliance, give it everything!" To his partner he demonstrated, he spiraled in front of an advancing colony looming for Avagon and those close. Loren split from him and barricaded Ren's sweeping physique.

"The Baurabor speaks no lies, only the Spirit can change destiny but not when confronted with the Surge!" Loren symphonized as he circled in an unrestrained patrol around Ren. He pronged the puff-staff at any advancing irritant, leanly recessing his motion. He charged Ren to ready and as if on cue, a pistol-bearing abomination shuddered from the deep and sprung into the heights. With a lash of a rope, the witch bridled a tug on the Sword of Primus and attempted to pull it away from the youthful regal's arms. She aimed the discharger, but Loren preventively fired the pufferneedles. "Son of Primus, the Dark Dweller's hold is laced to her, use the artifact!" He hastily updated, Ren stood back to follow suit.

"What? Have I seen her before?" Ren puzzled until he noticed a complexion of remembrance and her eyes of embers struck him, it was Lady Kyanna of the Leviathan Worshipers and the Imbibers! He scaled to the nearby mast using a bevy of refuse to station a higher threshold and slowly tipped out the 11th Treasure. He listened to a pained moan, then a revivified Vaecusa plunked to the surface.

"Where am I?!" The no-longer-possessed leader scooted her grated attention lengthwise as she emerged from her knees. Her stare had transformed from a flame and midnight to the tone of an ordinary viridian. Previously, Ren had never seen anything amiss with her.

"You were taken by the Dark Dweller, ma'am!" Loren granted late reply, bolting for Kyn. Vaecusa's confused rumple bustled to the mild lad, meeting glances. Loren pounced with a leap that was almost dilatory, but he appropriated his objective. He shot the remaining puffer spines from his dart-rod at the sequestering disciples that were dominating the grounds of the fracas between Avagon and Bloth. The hooklines the malefactors were operating clipped to the railing of the bulwark directly hindmost. "Lady Avagon! Severe them or the enemy will use them, now!" He entirely forbid any question, no reservations subsisting.

"Loren, you can't know by the Eight Bays of Mer the method from this barrage!" Though she wasn't one to doubt, Avagon prowled in a sidestep around her match of the pallor beast. She dashed in with a piercing speed and then fell back when meeting the metal, performing an agile roll before remounting. "Pirate, Barkeep. Concentrate on the otherside!" The ivory-adorned dowager issued an order for a better tactic to aim for the gem. Ioz and Zoolie were in-line with the plan but Avagon drew back, warning of a coming and greater dilemma. Over the spars of the foremast were strung any number inside a congregation of dark disciples, and all were prepared to vault for the lines. She instantaneously was on the stratagem, but the curses dropped in a volley.

"By the Trust of Kuunda! Tarogyn! Bisterptock! Myelkah and Toishuok! The Lifeblood and Protectors of the North, I thank you for this allowance of final act of retribution!" Kyn pronounced a magnificent oath as he whirled the sickle and propelled the handle into the atmosphere, skating to the ridge of the mainstay. On it's descent, it lit up into a triumphant rainbow of every glorious flavor of creation. Every man and woman on the Wave froze and terrifically beamed at the projection of a stupendous aurora of color, and soon a sonic-boom crashed as every repugnant false-life was torpedoed from the hull. The Kree regent doubled over after his charm with fading airflow, he closed his eyes.

"Kyn!" Loren slid with critical endurance to the deathbed of his fallen comrade, but he was not able to see a slate horror that was invisibly fast to his depreciated vision.

"Mmmm! Tasty snack!" Flying faster than ten gales, the atrocious demon gobbled both Loren and Kyn with little more than a word to divide his munching.

"That's it, Zoolie, go the other way! We can't fight him!" Ioz yowled with a stupefied summon of hysteria. The compatriots muscled a hook back from the budding massacre.

"Aaaahhhh!" The scream sounded from the counter side of the bow.

"Tula!" Ioz fretfully called back, about to leave his site. The ecomancer had collapsed on the platform, arm barely hanging off the banister to support herself. "Avagon, you need to call in reinforcements!" Ioz heartily compelled from the margin of the Captain.

"The Treasures of Rule belong to the Dark Dweller, give them to me or suffer the dire consequences!" Kerroptus hatefully contrived, diabolically floating over the deck with swooping black wings. He reached down to hook Tula about the waist. Ren acutely distressed, as he was nearby yet too far to reach. "Arhhhhhh!" Kerroptus shrieked terribly, the booming gulp could be heard. The Wave rocked as a grandiose head pounded the ship. Baby ate Kerroptus. Morpho dropped to the pier.

"Konk, keep steering! Get us out of here!" Bloth bellowed from the front of the board, severely losing wits. He was still entwined in combat with the trio of fighters but his peek rolled for the tide-washed Maelstrom.

PART ?

"Ren!" Another stray bid outcried from the high sky.

"Huh? Phorlock's squire?" Ren swung around to look and answer, but he was swept away by the gliding explorer before he could realize what even happened.

"Sorry I'm late, I would have been here sooner but I ran into a problem. Ren, you need to come with me. I'm going to show you to somewhere your yahil hoped he would never have to use." The stranger politely excused. Partially under the cover of a man's garb of service, soon she revealed herself to be the same woman who had traveled with Jazhea during the Raid of Wasps. "I haven't introduced myself, worthy Prince of Octopon. I am Saytasi, and you should know Kerroptus is not dead." Saytasi justly offered, filling Ren in on details. "This won't take long, but it must be done. If not, you will not be able to defend the Treasures." She carried on at a brisk pace, the prince noted her voice constrained a melancholy rhythm. She further lifted Ren away on the white dagron, speeding off from the coast of Octopon.

"What is Yahil? Kerroptus is not dead? Baby, the leviathan, ate him...that's, impossible! I need to get back to my frie-" Ren floundered on in befuddlement, wishing he was able to jump from the airborne reptile which prolonged his abductor's exodus. Saytasi seized the time.

"Your father, my native speech. He knew of a place that could stop him as a last measure, it was fortunate he did not need to use it because he did not have knowledge of Dual Energy back then. Your fight with the Dark Dweller is urgent but I promise this will be your last adventure, your friends will be fine as long as you do what needs to be done and we can reach the Cavern of the Surge before Kerroptus catches on. That is why we need to hurry." Saytasi annexed on an intently vital clarification.

"Cavern of the Surge? What is this the Surge?!" Ren stammered out, obstinately appealing to know. This would be the limit of his confusion on the subject, for too long he had heard the idea mentioned and he was never told. He needed to know now.

"The Surge, Ren. Is the closest substance to a neutral force on Mer. It can bind dark water to animate lifeforms, thus creating a hybrid being of evil, or anything really. Many alchemists and sorcerers tampered with it because of it's versatile qualities, it has very abnormal effects. Qui-Qua legend says that a cosmic storm shattered pieces of the moons of Mer, long before anything inhabited. This moondust, if you will, collided with the planet itself and eventually evolved into other lifeforms. Queen Avadasia was in fact said to have this element in her blood because she used it in so many of her experiments." With an unwavering truth Saytasi took an agile speed to accelerate beyond the columns of Octopon's main harbor.

"...The Abysmal Element Bloth told me." Ren scratched his head concisely, but then understood.

"You could call it that. There is no evil in the Surge, but neither is there good. At the end of her life, one of such backfired and turned her into a powerful creature. Kerroptus was a creature so malevolent, it could create quakes and shatter mountains. Supposedly, it could even rip fissures in the planet's core. We believe that Avadasia was transformed into Kerroptus, and is responsible for the year of the Black Tide and the unbinding of the dark water. The only way to stop him now is to go somewhere sacred, somewhere he cannot reach." Saytasi prudently told.

"But how? I thought when Kerroptus was sealed in the bell it would stop him...he wasn't this powerful before." Ren puzzled with a fathomable confoundment.

"He would not be this powerful if the Dark Dweller had not released him from the Bell of the First Sound in the wake of the Thirteenth Treasure. The Bell itself is forged from particles of the Surge and the susceptible material, Ruukaana. The Surge and the The Curse go hand-in-hand as do Ecomancy, or The Healing, and The Spirit. They are drawn to each other like magnets. Your King Primus was able to exploit a narrow loophole and in this way, sealed Kerroptus for the seventeen years of your youth." Saytasi briefly averted her spindly head to converse with Ren.

"So the Dark Dweller is behind his second release. The Spirit? The Curse?" Ren frustrated with a mental hindrance.

"The Spirit of The Treasures of Rule, the same light that is inside that Sword you hold, and you. The Curse is the Dark Water. We believe that for a long time, dark water was unable to penetrate Baanjamar due to the energy from the Treasures protecting some confines of the island. Now that those Treasures have been found, those barriers have opened and allowed a passage through. Unfortunately because Kerroptus is the embodiment of the Surge, he does not yield to the Treasures of Rule or the Dark water. If you remember the bottle I gave you in Kalinda, you can understand what a threat he poses." Saytasi began to explain before Ren bolted inwardly.

"Bottle? The only bottle given to me was by someone named Say, and it transformed my companion Niddler into a giant. It did the same to Konk too." Ren reported with some confusion.

"Yes, the Surge had transmutive properties. The difference is, what I gave you was pure Surge. For example, the Blight on Andorus is a very diminutive form of the Surge, and the breed you encountered was likely drawing power from the dark water as well. Kerroptus is indestructible by all means, unfortunately this is especially true when allied with the Dark Dweller. The more of the Surge that exists within a being, the more susceptible to the dark water they are. The only way to defeat him is to rend The Curse and The Surge from each other, binding them from any means of power." Saytasi ultimately detailed by the eddy of a charcoal hair-tail.

"I thought my father only told his trusted colleagues because of the threats on Octopon. I didn't know Kerroptus was capable of so much devastation..." Ren churned in this fog. Listening to the rhythmic wing-flaps of the dagron, he wrenched on how long this would really take.

"He did. After Qui-Qua was destroyed and before the first of many attacks on Octopon. Your father was no fool, he entrusted most of his life's work to his most faithful consort, Mizar. To be bi-versed is rare, to find a social adapter among the reclusive is to find a fleck of sand in a water-bed but King Primus succeeded in one of his most trusted cartographers and knights to be charged on Mizar's word. The Zuuror, my yahil." Saytasi set only forward from her flat lips. "Most of his scribed notes have been recovered after the incident, the original Common versions had been destroyed purposefully. After Mizar appointed me, I tried my best to hide them somewhere safe. Sadly, I do not know the whereabouts of your father's account, the Chronicles of Octopon. Mizar used the same Grutlamiran-Viper-Stout as your yahil before he was captured so he could reveal only minor details from memory while keeping his most valuable secrets about the Treasures of Rule safe from Bloth. My own yahil was his translator..." She broke.

"So father kept this scroll of the Treasures secret from Avadasia and Bloth to someday defeat them, their control of Valjen and the other islands? The House of my Father fought the naja-dogs who kidnapped my sister and slayed my brothers. It was because Avadasia heard word about a meeting of your home, Qui-Qua and mine, as what Bloth mentioned against her secret alliance with Valjen. When I was born my own father was trapped by Avadasia, which drove him to the Quest to finish what he started. His hunt for Kerroptus, to keep her from scattering the Treasures but my father failed even in binding her because Bloth knew he would return to Aymara." The hearty hero surmised as he remarked of his tense glare in the reflection on the Sword of Primus.

"Actually, Ren, it was not just that Bloth took over Avadasia's conquest after she became such an entity, it is known he commanded the enemies of the throne to do his dirty work. No one defeats Avadasia except for the Spirit and the Healing. Always be wary." Saytasi in conclusion delivered a delicate but tactful forewarning, spiraling barely from a crackle of the lightning tempest.

"Avadasia must have succeeded in using the Treasures to obtain immortality...through the Dark Dweller...and I need to stop her son from doing worse." Ren clenched his fist to an oath.

"Her power is not just that, Ren. Avadasia transforms herself into anything she needs to, including the fairest and most meticulous caretaker for the Zuuror of Qui-Qua after my mother passed. For the Valjen King she became the sharpest and the fittest warrior. For your grandfather, Neshean, she was the most gracious and good-willed. Iskjar took a wife to the wisest and most devoted priestess of his village. My Zuuror met your King on such grounds, they were caught in the previous twisted words of Avadasia's lies and truths. She was the ultimate eco-witch, her only weakness is that she cannot change her name when she assumes the will of another person. Mer's history scrolls show a Queen Avadasia from every prominent port and it's citizens, even more so." The tender pilot hid her affected anger by a shadowed droplet from her cheek. Invisible weeps on dot of a tiny mole washed the weakened beauty.

"So they did know her name...but why not try to stop her? Did only my father stand up to her? Would a kind king forfeit his kingdom and people even at the injustice of his friends? How is that right...?" Ren strained to understand, remembering how he thought of a possible advantage if he had known who Salamantha really was upon facing her down.

"Yes, he would. The Zuuror was taken by Avadasia's charms, Ren. He married her, and she was an evil influence to him but Avadasia succeeded because she took only what minimal energy she needed of a man's soul while leaving those things he loved intact, including the Zuuror's son and daughter. Valjen were our enemies as well as Octopon's, Avadasia persuaded him of a good solution in the form of an underground deal to save our people but Ruukaana from the mines would not keep us safe. Valjen would ask for more of us to be sent away quietly and more of our life-giving wealth, until we could barely eat and all of our duties were done for the outsiders. I'm a Tukla's sister and a Zuuror's child so I would have never suffered in a lifetime, but the slaves did...under the Queen of Corruption. Phorlock was the greatest Zuuror Qui-Qua ever knew...always followed the teachings of Toishuok, God of the Polar Star, and never was he abusive with judgment. One of the things he told me as a girl was that his unfair rules were for the benefit of those long passed and decreed in the time our home was going through destructive changes, but the people would not be persuaded otherwise. It is believed, even to this day, Qui-Qua is a place where princes reign and maidens bow. You see, I was once a rightful heir like you but I couldn't assume a position of power, because I was a Daughter." Saytasi granted the younger royal a gentle reason though she was completely still, as if in mourning for a beloved.

"Tula said it was once that way on Andorus. Is that why you dress as his squire?" Ren sympathized as he hugged snug to the leader, he couldn't prevent a flitting interest to a disappearing fixture of bones.

"I came close to realizing otherwise, but I made an error in proving a point with my cruel brother as he was at the time. I allowed myself to be provoked and I did something shameful, this I would rather not speak of but I can tell you that I know almost as much as Kings. You see, yahil and I..." The formal woman abruptly ceased. "We helped form a circle-alliance of the Northern nations called the Defenders of the Polar Axis and I was entrusted as his stand-in, a proxy for my yahil. I am Phorlock's squire to him as he is Sir Phorlock to himself, though it is not necessary. My people who know who I am respect me, but I find it feels more comfortable. Why? Just because." She swerved in the violent wind, mitigating the prince's remaining query. The crashing torrent of dense grime siphoned, begetting a moat of unimaginable depths before an untouched pillar that was located in the absolute nether-ground. "We're here." Saytasi aired with no emotion in her pitch, she led the dagron a vertical beeline to the granite checkpoint.

"That was fast." Ren commented on the laconic interval, with his eyesight he could almost make out the faint dot of Bloth's frigate and the giant Maelstrom in the proximate farsight.

"Of course, the outpour of the Teeth of Moltis does not flux a great throw from the Crystal City. Though I'm sure it's not anything like you remember." Saytasi earnestly remarked, she dismounted her beast on the dragging robe. "Now as I have said before, we will not be long." She directed at Ren as she traipsed for the endless depression in the smooth circlet of terrain, which was obscured in entirety.

"So what should I do?" Ren warily followed, boggling of his errand as he slowly surveyed the loop of sediment and the encircling gully the dark water was draining into.

"This trench." Saytasi beckoned Ren forward. "Make haste, as well." She called the young man over.

Ren pad to the side of the Quin native, his blue rings of brilliance set on the immaculately piceous shaft dipping like a sinkhole as far as the mind could depict. No ladders or aids down were present. "Whoa...Down here?" Ren almost tripped. "Have you ever been down there before?!" He questioned with a skeptical emphasis on his overseer.

"No." Saytasi firmly returned. "You will need this." She spoke to him, laying a tetrad palm on the wrist containing the Sword. "The powers of this weapon need awakening, or merging, before you can properly stand a chance against Kerroptus." The resilient Saytasi avouched. Ren skirted to the edge, suddenly turning a woozy paunch.

"Saytasi." Ren started to formulate. "There's something unfamiliar, yet..." He bore into the imperceptible aperture with a fledging hypnotism. For a reason, he could not hustle himself from trying to descry the kind of awareness ventilating from the gorge.

"That's because it contains that which you are most familiar with." Saytasi alleged, her even-headed demeanor subsisted. Her aqua eyes began to flit to shadows on the earlier horizon. Streaks of gold and blue sizzle cut the obsidian sky.

"How far?" Ren remained still, assaying with uncertainty. His vision could not drill through the supernatural nothingness. Saytasi lashed around by the nape at a harrowing screech, wholly halted.

"Mak Toi! Forgive me for this, Prince of Octopon, but you hurry like brother amends!" The last human voice Ren heard then transpired.

Ren screamed. He plunged deep into an endless vacancy, booted into the ditch. It felt like he was falling indefinitely, Saytasi's echo had long since faded from his countenance. His brooding wandered to his failure that stung like an awful dream and not reality as he continued to recede, having had not yet hit bottom. He could not count the time that had gone by, being too venomously flabbergasted that she had betrayed him. For the rest of his time he would curse himself for ignorantly becoming fodder for such a ploy. If she had wished for the Treasures for herself, to revive her family, could not be told but he would remain bitter as he passed away from anyone who could have helped him. He truly despised himself now for naively collapsing into this clever game, like he had done with Kerroptus prior. Now, Mer was doomed. Promised a terrible devastation, and he would never see anyone again. Forever.

"Kerroptus will swallow you, pitiful prawn!" Ren chased a tormenting Kerroptus as she wrought the crew of the Wave overboard, those who survived were retreating to the Maelstrom. The world spun so fast colors and shapes of the surrounding furnace blurred into a continuous ring as the spiraling broke a barrier of clarity. Ren descended through an endless chasm and repeating swirls down to the beyond, which he could no longer stand in the shaking wind. Broken necks created by the dislodging torque would seem like a simple injury when the worst crash of his life ended Ren in front of the Constrictus pit on the Maelstrom, Bloth and the other shipmates were no where to be told.

"There you are, I've been looking all over for you!" Instead of the nightmare the terrorized descendant expected, a serene woman raced at him in it's place.

"Who are you?" Ren could not contain a blush as he set eyes on a stunning blond with a fragile face, the cutest he had ever seen. His cheek shivered at such a soft and innocent voice of one so caring. That sweet brown gaze beamed straight on him, full lips of gentle crimson. She shied from the awaiting hug she was about to deliver, as if she were desperately hurt or in some kind of impeccable trouble.

"Don't you recognize me? From your dreams? You would think about me all the time, I'm your wildest fantasy! Don't you remember waiting for me all those lonely evenings, at the lighthouse? I'm here so now we can have the perfect relationship, together! I just want to love you!" Tears of joy slid from the angel's girlish lashes as she squeezed the debonair prince as a pillow. "I'm sorry, would you like to sit a while and talk?" Her ruby mouth gleamed with a generous smile as she tried to lead the resisting hand with a kindly giggle.

"No. I don't know you, I've never seen you before. I think you have me mistaken for someone else." Ren trembled in his rejection but he slowly backed away and shuffled to front the frame of the ship, even though the stranger was cornering. He perilously aimed to spot his friends, wherever they may be.

"Perhaps I've made a mistake." Cast down was a dejected image of a warm-hearted suitor, pained in sadness. "I know, let's play hide and seek!" Two smooth and vibrant hands clasped over Ren's pupils before he could object. Shoving her off in a wrestle of palms, he defended his isolation and ran on boots of Fezwa. When the figment had mutated out of his view he busied his soul on readying the least of Bloth's scout-ships for the persons of his dangerous search. Hauling the line, he scanned for a vessel to tie his transport by the board as he hastily foraged for emergency carry in a rucksack. Ren swayed at Tula.

"Ren, there you are!" Tula's vogue whisper strut closer with a swing of curvy hips, an emerald waistsash collapsed in the breeze as she wrapped her arms to encase the shoulders of an insulted colleague. The tongue reached for his awed jaw.

"You're not Tula!" Ren pushed at the false woman, kneeing the concave stomach as he wielded the Treasure of Rule in his burning strain.

"I am you!" Avadasia's despicable slime swallowed the Octopian's knee and tore meat from bones, Ren melted into the Constrictus pit as he was torn up inside. The world fell and although he lamented his terror, a peculiar sense rushed his mind. Something of both the unseen and the unperceived, the ticking sound he had completely ignored upon entry became indubitably louder. He could not see, but a force set his mind aglow. It made him jolt for a meek instant.

"Noy jitat!" Then, he yelled. Ren found his arms had equipped themselves over a gradually cranking pendulum. He did not think his eyes were open but somehow, he could see a picture clear as the zesty Merrian-sun in his Self. He awed at a series of weight-driven levers, entwined and leading upward. Some spanned farther down. It appeared to be a continuum of ornate levels and cogs, progressing to an infinity. In the heart of the entire series, what appeared to be a radiating star pulsed. Ren set his focus on a nearing ingot that was crossing into range. From his location, he swung forward and jumped with an athletic mastery. Ren procured a spot on an abutting component, this one prevailing him a greater advancement to the shining source. With his determination, he cleaved onto the hoisting spoke and scaled onto the final lift from an upended climb. He clacked breathlessly nearer to the aura.

"My Son, Ren!" From the central sphere, words cried out. Harmoniously, an azure-eyed elder with a fluid beard of white stretched out.

"Father!" Ren yielded instantaneously.

"Do not concern yourself with those who touch the dark water!" Rigel resounded in a flash of white as Ren revered with vigilant ears. "The Dark Dweller will not destroy those beyond this life, you must stop the Dark Dweller and Bloth at all costs!" The parental vision counseled. He enlivened the lesser man, who granted him due devotion. "This is a time when many will make a sacrifice. The Treasures of Rule can never be destroyed, but if they are to fall into wrong hands they will become corrupted and Mer will be tarnished. When that happens, all hope will be for ever lost." The patriarch of the crystal city forewarned, a second figure began to arise from his presence.

Ren's brain shook with encumbrance, stolidly on edge. "But Father, if I do that, then how can I say I would truly be King of Octopon? How can I fill your shoes when I can't even fill my own? I can't let anyone suffer if I can prevent it..." Ren muddled with hindrance, downcast and stilled.

"It is not a matter of choice, my Son. In your spirit the Treasures are within us all, only in the realm of our Treasures of Rule can they be linked to us. Should they be ruined I will not be able to contact you, and Mer is doomed to the fate of the Dark Water." King Primus ultimately stressed, he compelled Ren to meet his gaze aside.

"He is right Ren, you must do everything possible. For the sake of Mer!" The young Heir pivoted a glance to a speaking figure that seemed emphatically displaced.

"Tula?!" Ren sputtered when he began to mouth the name, Tula poised next to the monarch. The Andorian empath strode forward, encompassing her was a scintillating prism of turquoise and rose. "How?" He stuttered at what he saw before him, the wonder of two glorious phantasms busting in his consciousness.

"Kerroptus wants the Sword, concentrate and merge the energy! You have to help me so we can bend our strength into One Force!" Tula summoned forth as she drew her might, filling the space with a crackling charge and a dim hum. Ren could feel her power conjoining. The two hosts interwove and then the flicker of fluorescence could be seen, a blazing aurora was devoured by the stalwart blade. The rejuvenated man rebounded and then saw that both had vanished.

"Tulina!" Ren exclaimed as his consciousness drew to his central perception. Somehow, he knew what he said was Tula's Andorian name.

"Go with the blessing of the sea!" The ring of King Primus's effigy dissolved into the ether.

Ren was back in the chamber of levers, but no more gleam met his eyesight. Feeling himself traveling upward, he ascended the lofty expanse as he toted from each moving spar, pressing higher into the threshold. He could not imagine how long he could have been stuck, Tula and Ioz would be fighting the enemy on their own. The flare of something winged in his mind, he refreshed his eyes.

"Proficient. Now, we will not have to take a shortcut." Saytasi's definite phrase baited, Ren felt a hand pull. She promptly bounded for the original course.

The waterside near the Lighthouse was brimming with warring civilians. Somewhere off shore, the heavy tussle ensued in full. The Wave lurched through ominous ebb after a tremendous outpour of Octopian citizens boarded the creaking Maelstrom, drooping from brittle chains.

"Throw the Treasure to me! Hurry, before it's too late! Please Niddler! I need to find out where I am!" The image of a prince on the surface of a span of black harassed a floating monkeybird.

"Don't trust it!" Ioz scrambled out from the midst of battle and fending off an overpowering weapon of the enemy.

"Ren, I saw you take off with some dagron-rider." Niddler cawed back from the airway, uncertainly heeding the idol.

"A dagron-rider?! They must be near! Who? Tell me their name, I can destroy them from here!" The facade of Ren dictated from the water.

"I don't know, they flew away too quickly!" Niddler honestly screeched out, flitting away. "You're not Ren!" He contemptuously bid a last word at a wider distance.

Ioz sailed through the wind, rammed a monstrous flight from Bloth's strike. He let out a hysterical breath as he caught himself against the mainstay. "Noy jitat! Niddler, what in Kuunda's name did you and Ren do to blunt my jitatan sword?!" Ioz squeezed through his lungs with a terrible urgency, eyes stricken and dilated. Bloth's armor would have been split at the shock he laid down but yet trudged at him still. Overhead, Niddler sweat a nervous qualm.

"I can take up some slack, Ioz!" Zoolie covered for his friend, moving in on the hideous foe. He allot Avagon enough capacity for the occasional maneuver.

Niddler laid green eyes on the sorrowful ecomancer sitting on the back of a sluggish leviathan. "We have to let him go, Tula!" Niddler tried once more to goad the weeping woman away from the dying serpent. He compelled his craned and swiveling neck from an array of fellow battle-birds becoming chow for Kerroptus. "I'm sad for him too, but Ren needs us!" Niddler sadly whimpered, he flew the sorceress back to the ship despite some of Tula's reluctancy.

"We won't forget you!" Tula weakly cried from the Wave to Baby. The benevolent friend smiled at her like only a leviathan could before diving underneath the ocean and not resurfacing. Tula sniffed and wiped her clouded eyes.

"It's always a shame to lose one of these majestic creatures." The reborn and gentle Vaecusa consoled the charmer with a tender hug.

"That ecomancer is finished! Go after the boy and the 12th Treasure of Rule!" Morpho hissed from overhead, encircling the length of the vessel with Kerroptus. The squalid cover of vapor signaled a storm brewing on high.

"There is no place he can hide from Kerroptus!" Kerroptus affirmatively brazed with the most destructive of intentions. The portrait of Ren disappeared from the sea of obsidian.

"Ah-ah! Don't forget I have the 13th!" Niddler fluttered in the path and shrewdly lured the pair, unleashing a harried squawk as soon as he had done so.

"Come on, Bloth. You may be the strongest but you ain't the brightest on the twenty seas! You don't watch yer back very well, I'll bet even Konk is deceiving ye! There's gonna be a knife in it soon if you don't hand over that bauble, and I'm not the deckhand who is going to chomp your barnacle-noggin whole!" Zoolie berated as he swung against the efforts of the Pirate Lord, both meeting each other in a simultaneous motion.

"You say that as if Mantus's dishonesty is such a blow to me." Bloth genuinely laughed, to Zoolie's fumble. "How do you think he joined me in the beginning?" With a sly grin he provoked the barkeeper.

"You're full of mistakes, Captain. First Phorlock of Qui-Qua escapes from his imprisonment on the Maelstrom, and shore-training of Mantus on 'Leave. Then you let Mantus talk you into making a stowaway third-mate, he framed the innocent girl so you wouldn't find out he let her dad go free from the brig!" Zoolie sputtered after being taken aback.

"You know I needed the jewel within Mantus's wench to obtain the secrets of the Treasures of Rule and the Chronicles of Octopon from Mizar. My commander's nightmare venom won't take their soul, as I'm sure you found out too late." Bloth snorted with callous delight as he ambled.

"Aye, you made Mantus work her till the end while taking every piece of gold she won so she would persuade Mizar to tell you about the cursed map of Arakna isle, but then she stole it from him." The barkeeper lunged at the Captain with a cantankerous defiance, he rebelled against everything from day One.

"Did you not think I knew it was impossible for your sweet dear to pull my hatch open by herself?" The insidious Captain chuckled. "In order for that frail vagabond of Primus's league to escape through the intakes, Kayraadin would have needed to first go below deck to reach the entryway, even with the combined strength of herself and Mizar she would not be able to budge the lever or wind the valve. Not that she would have known where it is, Zoolie. Only a ballast-brain would not know his own ship, my man, and only a gaff-soaked krill-eater would give a dingamord the 12th Treasure of Rule." Bloth smartly rebuked, fancying the gleaming prize.

"Why did you let Mantus get away with it?! He betrayed your Quest for his own purposes! Loyal commander, my weapon's fringe!" Zoolie tripped over his own words, backing away in response and not believing for a moment the dreadful account of sin. Regretfully, those words mended his every inkling of confusion.

"Isn't it obvious? Saytasi the Sibyl of Qui-Qua...she chose to release her father from my ship in place of Mizar for only one reason. I'm certainly not fluent in Quin, that is what I needed my dishonest commander for! Thanks to his ploy the old man Mizar and his map were still up for grabs but even he didn't have the knowledge of Quin Draconik speech as Mantus and his imperial peers. However, if I had found either of those wastes, he would have joined his guuda-blooded friends in the brig! Enduring his own punishment!" Bloth heartily laughed of his past actions.

"Aye, I've heard enough from your ambush to keep the war going on Qui-Qua with the Valjen ships you stole-and-boarded, no quarter given. I know the tale of strange gems shipped to Octopon so tell me this Bloth, why would the Prince of Octopon sail all the way to Qui-Qua...in the Heart of the North Star? Phorlock must have asked Primus to evacuate his people from the Ruukaana mines before Mantus made high-treason because that jitatan metal is cursed, dark water leaked to the sea-fields of Ebron by the time their Quest began. Like my rumorboat-spy, Joat said, Queen of Valjen started forging those counterfeit Treasures mistaken for the genuine trinkets with the help of a ruling-hand from Phorlock's district." Zoolie shrewdly examined, mincing details from the tavern.

"In the pitiful case of Mantus, this isn't the first time he's been deceived. My promise to let him buy the Maelstrom to take out his rage with the Valjen naja-muzzles was only on the condition he could accumulate and keep just one piece of gold to add to my wealth of 999,999,999 drabuls at El Scorpascia, but I would gladly accept any more he managed to steal...without his knowledge of course. That was the one...profitable catch I forgot to tell him about." Bloth easily swatted at Zoolie's hit as he marveled on his own insidious penchant for manipulation.

"So you did promise Mantus payback for his pilfered birthright, why would he change sides for Avadasia of Valjen when she paid her pirates to ransom his mother at the Guuda-harbors full of Dark Water?" The red-beard sealed the gloating ox to a marking quandary in their equal match of backbone.

"For Mantus's Highness's interference with his imperial judgment is more like it. After the raid Avadasia helped our gullible Tukla of the North take over, I suppose it wasn't easy for Zuuror Mantus to let Qui-Qua's people go after the orders he signed to let his...second-in-legacy sister be put to death for leaking the scrolls on Phorlock's deals made to Avadasia, the Valjen Queen and the woman who brought the Pirate Lord to the seas, were challenged by the young Zuuror's father himself! Not to mention, Mantus's very birth on Valjen was a sham! If you could see his shock when he found out his father's shape-shifting wife kidnapped herself and faked her own capture to extort more valuables from Zuuror Phorlock. Imagine when my brother, Mantus, learned Avadasia's most beloved son took away his lavish life on land with a few unfortunate...accidents and truths but I was there, Zoolie. Who says all of my slaves have to be imprisoned?" The final taunt emphasized a sting.

"In that pathetic case I'll let you in on an ill-fated sea-fable, I hope you take it very well. Mantus let Mizar go from your brig with the Arakna map so you wouldn't ever be able to read Phorlock's message about the hidden River of Rule, you bottom-feeding snake! By the way, I didn't know about about the Surge until a good chum of mine let me in on how many years you've been out of port! I'd claim you an official jugmaster had I known you were that old. Kleepa in the jar for you!" The redhead seethed, deliberately padding backward. The lower foresail plummeted downward but did not meet the mark. The brute pounced closer, Ioz shot bolts deflected by the sword and plowed in from the sidelines in attempt to cripple the retaliating enemy. The cloud of a hidden bladesman lurked behind the fending mast.

The refugees on the boat clashed against the inevitable. Dark disciples continued to spill on to the deck from all sides, cornering the party.

"Take cover near Avagon!" The sounds of the crumbling resistance compelled. Few of the fighters fell to the ground. Avagon's greatest aide rounded the group, providing a shield.

"I'll say it again! If you want to challenge Avagon, you have to wait your turn!" Milinda effortlessly booted over a dark disciple from on the bow, stating her vigor. She did not realize how outnumbered she truly was and even though her stamina was dying, she pierced with a cutting cleaver until she was hurled from the verge. Inescapably, she was throttled from the pack.

"I can't do it anymore!" Niddler huffed as he came down for a landing out of the diversion.

Avagon struggled against the ferocity of the opponent. She could create a distraction with her own prowess, but she could not break through the solid-steel guard of the heinous overlord. The two allies by her standpoint were only inciting more rage. She witnessed a hazy apparition above her sightline, Kerroptus was languidly hovering over Bloth and planning to hijack. "Ioz! Zoolie! Look overhead!" Avagon screamed a vital direction, but she could not react soon enough. The vivid glint of the Treasure responded to another like it.

"Aaaaaarggh!" The screech of the demon ricocheted in the muggy clouds. "Who is responsible for this atrociousness? Who is arduous enough to dare defy Kerroptus?!" Kerroptus uplifted from his objective, skidding away from the severing trace of luster.

"Ren, I'm going to shore! I trust you'll take care of things here. Mak Toi!" Saytasi announced from atop an aerial lizard and hastily fluttered away.

"Got it. To honor for your own battle!" Ren issued the pilot an affable goodbye and set his vision on the looming beast.

"So, you think you can take me boy? You're going to sorely regret that audacity!" Kerroptus hissed from the airway, she smashed closer on her scaly wings with a threat of tearing away every limb from the new challenger. When she tried to move however, she winced in agony.

"No, but you can't! Not this time! Avadasia's reign is over!" Ren wore an assured grin, radiating with tenacity and spirit. He bolstered the Sword Of Primus in animation as he watched where Kerroptus had been previously scored. The hellion withered.

"Ren!" Tula rejoiced with a long-awaited hail. Somehow, she experienced a miraculous rejuvenation overtaking her. Kerroptus's duress had been decimated.

"You're going to pay for that!" Kerroptus burned with soreness at the brazen young one, she darted for Ren until she was struck down. She proceeded to become overwhelmed by misery, retching on the ground in woe as Tula's lightning pounded her.

"This is for what you did to Baby! And everyone else!" Tula screamed in a vengeance-stricken flurry. She dropped slam after tormenting blast of electric charge on the monster until her mark could barely move, squirming like a smothered gnat.

"No, the boy has done it! How can he separate The Dark Water from The Surge!" Morpho smoldered with an antipathetic desire as he began to approach with a reaching tentacle and a rickety arm.

"Ren, Bloth and Avadasia destroyed their home nation, they're extinct! Stalagor and Valjen are one in the same! The Valjen were only the defectors of the original Stalagorians who once lived at the South Pole of Mer. Before their time the land absorbed the most of radiation from the sky and the Surge was created by it. It seeped into nature and the Dark Dweller uses it to manipulate his minions, even something as common as an dartha-eel because the Surge has no destructive bearing on it's host!" Avagon strikingly informed from the short distance beyond.

"No destructive bearing, how can this be...? In our village we were overrun by the orange venom that was infecting us and it came from the rare Dartha-Nightmare-Eels after dark water was taking control..." From a static bounds upon the flat, Vaecusa gasped at a personal revelation.

"The Surge is invisible. Only the purple or gray is seen when it's merged with Dark water alone, the Surge and the Dark Water are more powerful when they are combined. Maybe the eels weren't mutated, but you were." Avagon crinkled her neck over to the reluctant guest to console her with a fair theory.

"So that explains it. Why our children were staying alive, even when some were born from the dark water, it made their eyes gray and distorted mine. They were drinking run-off from up North...but the Surge must have been within them. I must have been possessed for that long...what have we done!" The leviathan Queen suddenly added to Avagon's discovery with a bold profession.

"Kyanna! Let's get you safe." Ioz hassled to escort the village chieftain away from present hazard, a rocky grapple wrapped his shoulder.

"No one can defeat me, it's not possible!" The degenerate lifeform clawed at the grain of plank comprising the sodden deck with a blaring sound of despisal. She ripped forward on supine arms to take a shot at the victorious foe, but was unable. Ren pointed the blade at the savage.

"Go now! Leave and don't come back or I'll end you right here! You'll be turned into stone! Because you know you'll be frozen by the dark water if the Surge touches any light." Ren threatened with the ponderous weapon, swinging it from side to side. Kerroptus flapped her wings to attempt to enter the sky, but by the time she touched the brim of the perimeter, she melted. Dark water wrought a stupendous wave that swallowed the miscreant by the sharp toes, rapidly inhaling her into merciless oblivion. Disastrously, the same apostles were ascending the up the ledge, this time baring pistols. "By the twin moons!" The prince heatedly repelled, he escaped a stream.

"Bloth, there's trouble staying on course! If we go away from the armada we're sure to meet more-Aaahhhh!" The wail from a deckhand who was a short length away afflicted as a bombardment of inky goop commenced to bring about an internal collapse. It took every particle of verve from Ren to reach the mishap before steep parts of the ship could erode. Bubbles of violet fizzed and popped.

"You thought you could break me..." Ioz remorselessly scorned. He emerged from the base, lashing at the opposition with a dull edge. His breath hammered in his ears. He glanced away momentarily to procure a window of a retreating Ren. He peered at the excessive hand once more, then up. He beat at the adversary's oversize razor with his own nullified edge.

"Did you think you had me fooled? I knew you were out for my neck ever since you came crawling back from Tayhoj." Bloth atrociously disclosed. He hefted the sable warrior up by the arm as he blocked away a hit from the tavernkeeper. "Unfortunately for you, Ioz, and your fellow mutineer, there is no taking down those with lavish might. You'll join your foolhardy father who believed he could as well, before he could be granted the opportunity to go public with his proposal of treachery." The heartless Captain tore a dagger in front of his abominable arm to startle Ioz's wilting stomach.

"What?! Mantus set my father up when he was thieving as Z.M.Q., Raymit never stole any rotten coin from you after he paid off his debts." Ioz punched at the air in heaving spite. Bloth laughed.

"Not so, you never knew the story of your father's lies? Like father, like son, Ioz. Remember how your Captain Raymit was made to pay for the one time he didn't gamble? Before his dear departure in the Heave-off he talked to his brother, the Advisor to the Abbey of Galdebar...who in turn met King Primus while in Octopon and found out Raymit was alive and well as one of my crew." Bloth rapidly smacked Ioz's strung-up jaw with pressure behind a spiked knuckle when he bent his squelching muscles to attempt breakout, enjoying the strong swashbuckler's frustrated weakening.

"Out with it, Bloth." Ioz spat with rigor in solitude, a grimace stole his mask of courageous ambition.

"The poor King of Octopon always did have a blabbing mouth, to anyone but the Captain who could have given him vast riches had he cooperated, of course. It was a special delivery from Valjen, and shortly before the King set sail for my brig that I found out that your dear...Mutiny-Scheming-Old-Man did not like the idea of preemptive attacks against foreign lands for minerals like Ruukaana and other unknown Treasures, including your own home island. Too bad your father's plan to protect his side of Tayhoj from my invasion by his own hands never worked out. He just needed to bring a Captain's Age into the deal." Bloth partially amused a punitive thirst to torture the persecuting assailant. He purged Ioz's weary physique against the nearby foremast.

"You should have carried your evil out straight up, instead of slapping a different rationale on it!" Ioz heckled the villain, soothing his throbbing scalp with a palm as he pierced with a glare of animus at the daunting tyrant. There was no gloating from Bloth this time, only a culminating storm. The genial pirate's senses relinquished for one pause. Multicolored feathers demanded his scrutiny.

"Ioz, there's a problem! The Treasures aren't warding against aerial attacks by the dark disciples!" Niddler squawked in a frantic uproar, he soon dispersed to fend away a spritz of invading liquid overtaking the peripheral. Frothing murk soon dematerialized to a gilded hoop.

"Is that so? Well, Ioz...sometimes power is much better practiced when it's kept in close proximity." Ioz could hearken a chilling gnarl following the Captain's digress before feeling an awful pain in the side. Ioz toiled to balance on legs and solace where the concrete sole had implanted into ribs. One man howled as the other stood, pleased with his work. Bloth was too close when he jostled Ioz, who flung his integral self to prevent the damaging and slaughtering slicer from bringing him down. With a bash from his sword, Bloth artlessly prevented the other man's shield.

"You jitatan-fool! We're being taken over! I never told anyone how you lost your eye, and Raymit's memory is the first chungan greeting you gave me when I came back." Ioz coughed as Bloth advanced. Rile slipped out of his dry panting and begged for why he went so far to put his life on the line for his only friends in this impossible Quest. The aggressor was set on finishing the job. Bloth's blade clacked to counter a splintering beam of glow. "Noy jitat, Ren! What did you do to my sword?!" Ioz squeezed out a complaint, all but given up on trying to resist against any more ruin.

"I'm sorry, Ioz! I needed to to get the-" Ren swayed his attention to Ioz but for an instant, and did not end his phrase.

"He needed it to help me!" Bloth declared his tyrannical supremacy, towering over the yelling protector. He had planted a monstrous toe on the skull of the young prince, pressing with an attempt to crush.

"Let him go, Bloth!" Ioz smoldered with resistance, assuming an upright position. Bloth leered. "Today is the day you go down!" He lunged forward with a heroic thunder, ignoring all inhibitions to wobble the monster with his dented cutlass. Ren rolled away and immediately braced in a guarded crouch. Ioz hissed, an injured jolt clouding his resilience.

"Leave Mer and it's people be! You're going to be sorry you ever came out of the ocean!" Tula scraped from the ridge on the other-side. Her cyclonic blaze ripped and filled the sky, encircling Morpho with a chaotic gyration. The humongous tempest developed into a being of it's own capacity, shredding and rupturing. Morpho howled in terror as he plunged from the railing and into the dark lake. She bent down, sweating from a noticeable and dull ache in her temple.

"Tula!" Niddler called from closeby. "We're being overrun!" Niddler shrilled with despondency from pounding a dreaded fanatic over the strangest-formed cranium. The ringed Treasure of gold he toted was not dispatching the scourge fast enough. Avagon's freedom-army was clambering into the hold for safety, one by each person. Some failed as dark water began to encroach on everything in the external landscape. Tula's eyeline cleared on that of the startling sight of her two dearest companions.

"Ay jitata! Ren and Ioz!" The ecomancer gasped. "Niddler, try to fight them off. I need to reach them! Quick!" Tula hurried away with a concurrence from the faithful monkeybird. She galloped for the men on the blotching platform.

"Let it go, Konk, or we're all going to visit the depths below!" Niddler squawked, contending with Konk for control of the wheel. The ship bounced and the runt was temporarily jerked from his place. Some of the subhumans tripped and glided along the floor. Pirates from Bloth's crew flew in all directions, frantically making effort to stabilize the lurch. The disrupters were loose once more, nebulous water splattered. It spotted and inked the deck, spreading ever more.

"Fools! We need to set course for Octopon, the seastorm is to the West!" Avagon strictly slammed, she kneed Konk in the stomach and at last gained authority of the helm. Many of the raiders began to scream, striving to pull around.

"Bloth! The Treasure!" Ren besieged as he sprinted toward his enemy. He withheld his sword at the side in preparation for attack. Tula and Niddler followed Ren as they stood back against the wall of foreboding cohorts that were attempting to infect the sails. Ren swept his magical shard at the advancing army. The Pirate Lord was hesitating to hand over his plunder. "Bloth, if you want to stay alive, give me the Treasure!" Ren valorously commanded. For once, the noble's competitor did as Ren told him, but with a cold sneer. Ren applied both the Treasure and the glittering Sword of Primus, smacking many of the progressing fiends overboard. He flipped up into the air and wobbled about the mainmast, sliding down in a centrifugal maneuver. He spiraled back onto the deck with both his feet and witnessed, to his misfortune, that the sea of black and the disciples were attacking the open areas of Octopon. The jewels had offered no protection from the other locations around the lighthouse. Morpho was leading the company of the fanatics on a huge mass of corruption. Ren observed the aquatic wretch give him an insane and dooming stare. "We'll steer to the lighthouse!" Ren impetuously demanded as he regained the wheel of the ship, Bloth and his men were still huddled in one section behind Ren.

"Ren, we'll never make it in time...this ship isn't fast enough." Tula disastrously signaled with an awful bid to the ripping current on the fading sand. For a long time, the scene on the Wave was quiet.

"Go to the Maelstrom, you'll have a better chance there." Ren wholeheartedly whispered a firm directive.

"But...you have to come with us." Tula refused obstinately as she watched the massing piles of Octopian citizens that had boarded the no-mans-land out of desperation.

"I'll join you as soon as I can." Ren passed fleeting contact as he made one more promise. Tula hustled to abandon the Wave and Ioz led the deed to scale the anchorage. Ren gathered the 12th Treasure and bounded for the chain on healthy strides. When there he shimmied up the base, aware Bloth climbed in his fog.

"You take the Maelstrom, boy, I'm going my way!" Bloth wrestled Ren by the ankle with an energetic dare of pride. In a sudden flip of a weighty wrist he employed the potion left from Morpho at his archnemesis and their souls swapped once more. Bloth skid to the stern of the Wave and using Ren's able body, he set to cast out with the Treasure.

"I like the cut of your sail, sir!" Ren mounted the links and began to climb with the strength of twelve full-sized pirates in the muscles of Bloth's body, unleashing a clunky chortle. He galloped over the ledge of bones where a washed-up crew and misplaced persons footed to and fro. Dropping the broadsword, he zipped a wink at a discerning Tula as she spent some ecomantic zest consoling one of Ioz's injuries. Though the Wave was skimming far at high-wind, Ren steeled the Maelstrom's helm. "If you sea-roaches want to see another day then by the abyss, ram that boy's ship and get the Treasure!" Ren hammered out the most barbarous directive he ever shouted. The men made haste at Ren's orders and obediently tacked the Maelstrom to a chase of the lesser warship. The hulls collided, ending with a frigate partially overturned on the peninsula of an Octopian land-strip, a blond Bloth wrung his fist in threat of violence.

"Your ability to handle a ship is worthless, you puny boy! Give me my body back!" Princely yells rolled up from the anchor cord of the bony megalith as Bloth reversed the spell in a limber leap before Ren could dispute otherwise. The royal-bearing Bloth tackled Ren for proving better at being Bloth than Bloth was at being Bloth.

"I thought you would come around." In a level-headed confidence Ren peeked his blue gander on Bloth and regained place of the wheel, he rotated portside on a stable hand. The Maelstrom weathered the weary rainfall with little damage as it headed toward it's target at Ren's steering. That was, until another disciple began to climb up the ship where Bloth's crew stood.

"Let me go you bilge-eating worm-face augghh!" Tula shrilled from a length off, she hooked a leg at the undead commander that refused to let her go. Protruding spikes from the adversary's shoulder budded and plowed from the inception.

"The Dark Dweller will make good use of you, wench!" Dark Mantus rasped, reeling the pink-clad mage closer to termination. The boiling revolver cased in his lanky knuckles prodded at leafy eyes, until a boom could be heard. The gust had awoken in a wrath known only to the deceased swabs of olde. The pillar of cracked spine-ribs splintered and slivered to the rear of the apostle-boss as a spar broke loose. Tula slammed a toe into the scant paunch and fled without delay. The population of the Maelstrom fought to carry sealegs in the swaying gale.

"Chungo lungo!" Ioz eminently hollered. The concealed cloud that hung behind him was endeavoring to clobber him. He bolted for Dark Mantus with throbbing arms and his stripped weapon was at last bashed out of his arms, he thwacked on the stiff landing. Genuine thunder exploded nearby.

"By my beard, you just won't stay down, kelp-chugger!" Zoolie shouted at the convert. With the remainder of his stamina, he wrestled Mantus away to the opposite ledge but verged on unsteady collapse as he tried to ward away the foul phantom. The cultist toted a pistol of murk, aiming it.

"Not so fast. You haven't given me a last meal." The Dark Disciple Mantus scratched the call of a lower lifeform from his lengthening midsection, ankles slid several lengths in reverse while keeping the abysmal slime aligned with Zoolie's neck. The hands like vices stretched to the top of Mantus's spiny mane, stiffening into black quills. "Move back, I have a deal to fulfill with that human wench." The springing appendages locked upon Tula's waist, a high-frequency screech bounded on the fire-buccaneer's rebelling blade. Zoolie winced in a helpless observation. Speedier than an equatorial twister, Mantis was laying Tula flat on the watery planking as she squirmed inside a trapped standstill.

"Tula, I'm sorry for not trusting you!" Ren swiveled forward to apologize for ever doubting Tula's warning, compelled by the disarmed and toppled sorceress. He curled to meet the gray shell to break her free, Mantis raised a goring arm.

"It's ok, Ren! You have to let me go or one hit will turn you into a Dark Disciple, and infect you with the poison!" The burdened ecomancer averted her eyes as Mantis's intestinal blood-plasma dripped one grain of timber from her sweat-slick face, and she groaned in regret. So many of her empathetic instincts held her back. When she was paralyzed by the uncrackable claws she screamed for him to stop, two veined wings blanketed her feet and traced up her hips. She shivered in low of spirit, Ren would be irreparably changed.

Mantis lashed his tarsus, but the column crushed his speckled feeler. The boom collapsed and tore Tula a hightail. "I think it's time to stop dismantling the ship now." Ren floundered as he watched two more demonic invaders with pistols began to clap up the mighty hull. In a daring move, he attempted to drive them off with the Treasure. Ioz and Zoolie flopped on top of a dweller-blooded mule that had strayed from the horde.

"I'll make you into a dark disciple the most effective way. "First the implantation will begin in slices I will make on your warm carcass, then I'll make sure no one wants you!" The mantid creature hissed with a frothing presence, he kicked the blockade off of his toe and scurried for the femme. The predator swiftly hunted as Tula wriggled abound a heavy guard, ducking into a vat of dagron-sewage. Mantis pinned the wailing man to the deck as the acidic drool splashed in splotches on his flesh and produced a fine odor, the living meat's cries were slowly garbled away by pink goo. "No one will help you, wench." He felt on the brim of the husking for anything pretty, salivating and ready. Tula clenched her silent lips.

"Come here, beast! Let me teach you a thing or two about how to treat leviathans!" Vaecusa whistled a distraction, the monolithic Mantis rushed her before it had even begun. Tula fled for another round as the monster insect mashed flesh of a fighting Vaecusa, shredding the innards between her abdomen and stomach. Mantis chewed and swallowed the entrails but he was far from full, devouring seven more begging prey before crawling to the ceiling of the Maelstrom's galley to wait.

Delta huddled in a breathlessly-enclosed sphere of her own throbbing limbs. The Maelstrom had been her safe haven ever since the crusher was marooned in the middle of nowhere, but 'She had started sailing by a magic mechanism as if a ghost were at the helm. The chaos and raids of an Octopon eclipsed in rot was no where she wanted to be, but now only death was prepared for her future. Mantus had spotted her, she shivered. Ioz was not far away, but the handsome pirate hadn't paid any mind to her since he sighted her on his boarding.

"Where is he? We've got to find my darling and my brother! Ren! Ioz!" The fast dame outcried, holding a firm hand over a few patches on her side.

"Noy jitat, it's Mantus! And he's dead!" Delta astounded over a tiny squeal, stopping in her tracks.

"Noy borga!" Solia breathlessly shrieked.

"Run the other way!" Delta immediately impelled. She yelped from an aching side, protecting Solia who almost tripped on a dull ankle. The duo bounded until they witnessed something fluctuating from the vacuum. The peg-legged runt hobbled by, sprawling the new arrivals. The slum pair stumbled over him and cascaded to the planking, yowling with pain.

"Out of my way, girlies! Konk need to go hide!" Konk boorishly pronounced with an inevitable dread.

"No! If you want to live, then you'll suck it up like everyone else!" Delta lifted herself up with a snarky retort and armed herself with a loose floorboard.

"Big brother!" Solia called out to the man, who granted her an expression of disorientation. She coughed as she almost ended her prance on her sprain.

"You shouldn't be here! Oh Kuunda..." Ioz yielded a stressed remark from straining to cull up a Tayhoj-born adolescent from the undertow.

"Ay jitata! That rib doesn't look good!" Solia effectively choked with a languid fever when she staggered over the tipping obstacle on a sprain, far from a secure floor she spotted the bane of the brave pirate's suffering.

"Better advice, sister?" With no time to ease his flurry of dicey excitement Ioz jumped from the rickety cuddy to defend Solia from the partition Mantis's segmented legs were wrapping around, and now pinning the aqueous anthropoid.

"My savory slum-maiden, you're too bony to make a good meal...perhaps I'll make you into one of my Master's dark disciples." Delta's heart saw true fear as Mantus's hungry croak marred her oily ears, a piercing wail squeezed from sapping lungs in the crux of the skewing forelegs. Between bloodied limbs the voluptuous newt-woman was fastened, he not only dangled Delta from his tarsus but pinched her tighter to eliminate resistance. Mantis anticipated the enjoyment of Delta's soft and flexible bones, in the Bai-newt he found more interest at the skimpy rags that clothed her wrestling legs as she cried. Wings fluid like water, his abdomen curved for her leisurely.

"Be gone with you, monster!" The blaze of Ioz's stalwart will pumped boiling outrage at the disciple vermin, and with a painful swing Delta landed unsafely divided on the curving rail. The tips of the bones declined where her feet stayed in awkward posture, but wrest the lake-breeder on tiptoes and to a drop.

"Let's see if you've got what it takes to slay a twelve-foot Mantus!" Zoolie summoned Ren near to the danger as he clanked a reinforced cutlass to the mantis monster, which was tearing out the tubby guts of a pirate. Mantis threw his current meal to the below Constrictus-pit, allowing Ren to switch stances with the barkeep. Shrieks recoiled from the oversized pest, claw ineffectual at denting the Sword of Primus. Mantis retreated to the peak of the crow's nest on four feelers at one slash of the young aristocrat's heirloom.

"Delta!" Though the blue and pink performer received due aid from the powerful sailor, she inhaled onerously but her chest stopped for a beat. Ioz welled in mourning, like his younger Quester who acted on always. His rib ripped under the weight on one of the few heroic movements he risked to prevent the woman's smash to rock-bottom, with the slip of her slimy mitt he rued her fall to the abysmal tide. Delta in her sensitive frame dried and decayed soon as her amphibian skin plopped through the briny sea below.

"Ioz!" Elastic piles sunk by disintegration before the unfortunate voice screamed his name.

On the above upside of the mizzenmast spar, razor jowls crushed their skulls. Mandibles the size of Grutlamiran-lobster fangs crunched through the bone of the howling pillager. Mantis darted voracious-feelers-first down to the deck, slinging from teeth like shards the empty body aside. "Mantus is still hungry..." The killer scanned with compound eyesight for a filling meal, his tempered clack sharpened on a thick Captain. Bloth's livid lips fouled.

"M-Mantus! Why are you looking at me that way? Stop I sayy, that is an order!" Bloth hopped around the broken obstacles on his own ship with a wrenching wail. He lumbered fast as his trunk legs would allow him to go but try as he may, Mantis's pounce was even too speedy for the brutal pirate.

"Welcome home, Lord Bloth." Mantis closed in as he clicked venom at a cornered and edible prey. Mucous dribbled on to the mast ahead, missing a shaking Bloth's toe but dissolving the wood underneath.

The insect screaked on the blinding light of the Sword in it's path, Ren grimaced on the life of the plundering Captain. "You're part of my crew, Bloth, whether I want you to be or not, and I don't break my promises." The prince hauled his armament off and heaved a groan of relief, Mantis shrunk to a man-fit disciple. Fanatic Mantus rubbed his wobbled temple, pulling out a human belt-ring on his tangled hair.

"Ren! Why?! We would have been rid of him, you'll find out wrong who your real mates are!" Ioz struck harsh counsel at his captain's bold and hesitant mercy. His breakdown of flesh panged nothing to what the crewmates would suffer from his premonition, he dreaded dearly for that weak courtesy young Ren bestowed.

Ren continued to cross blades with Bloth, hoisting a guarding arm over his top. When his neck wrapped with a slimy limb, he thrashed at the offender. Morpho resurfaced with a disdainful gurgle, unrelenting in a suffocating hold. Ren felt the dragging of the glacial fingers on the other shoulder, being yanked for a manifold of critters barring pistols of the flowing ooze. "Time to surrender to your fate, Son Of Primus! You need to be thanking me for saving your life, if I did not with the Great Wave that let the Maelstrom down easy and blew it off course you and Bloth would have destroyed each other. It is in my Master's interest for you to fight, you will become one with the Dark Dweller when this world is under our control now! Ahaaahahahhaha!" Morpho broke into a deranged spree. "You'll soon all be grateful when you belong to my Master! Kneel before me pitiful merlings, as he allowed me the ability to conjure the Great Wave and demolish those foolish enough to challenge his dominion!" The berserk deformity reveled in awful destruction. "All of the Treasures and the Compass of Rule will soon belong to the Dark Dweller! Make it easy and give them to me!" He rasped a menacing babble, zealots aligned and spurts fired. Most barely missed the blond protagonist.

"Let Ren go!" Tula pounced on Morpho with a furious wail but could not compel the disciple to release the captive, she tumbled to the floor to briskly remount in her prior posture.

"So it was you, you thin-skinned darva-worm! There in Janda-town I was thinking it was the local color, let me give ye a little gratuity!" Zoolie affronted with a brawny assault on the foe. Morpho naturally recoiled a mere nail-length.

"You! You thwarted my plan to retrieve the 12th Treasure of Rule before Ren!" Bloth himself choked an enlightened word, he skid for Morpho. The sycophant efficiently sidestepped. Ren wrenched to buck Morpho off and reach for the helm. Bloth suppressed the mutation, using volcanic strength. The royal was set free by the Captain's blanched arm.

"Now you are ready to become a dark disciple, Bloth." The mutant rasped as he tried to reach a repulsive grip around the heavy buccaneer. "Poor Vlor." Morpho hissed an insidious confession.

"Poor Vlor, indeed. Now you die." Ioz joined the rally with an accursed directive. With his drawn intensity, he chased Morpho overboard and gaped for breath to await the woemaker's brief return. "Chungo lungo. We need to get rid of them..." He achingly cursed. He was so engrossed in his own distress, he could not obtain a glance at the shadow that stalked about his inverse.

Ren assessed damage to the Maelstrom. He left the wheel. "Tula, take the helm!" The prince yelled out to his companion on the ship and chucked the diamond gem to her, but before she could comply Ren's wrist that held the Sword of Primus was being irongripped by his worst enemy in the twenty seas. "Let go! Can't you see we're under attack?!" Ren scraped with a punch, unable to rend Bloth's retention.

"Stay away from Ren!" Ioz shot for the foe and his captured companion with a fatigued outcry. Using the last of his resilience, he slugged a furious elbow to the ogre's arm and Ren was able to rumble himself free. The worn Ioz sunk down, Bloth wrung a fist around the throat of the swart warrior.

"Are you getting that warm and fuzzy feeling?" The vile scoundrel teased his new victim, granting Ren an awful sneer. Ren tore away at the brute's paramount form, and did not prevail. The ringing clank of failure flooded the lamentable earshot of the brave regent.

"No ya don't!" Zoolie ensured his fellow's salvation when he hastily scurried away from an armed Dark Mantus, who was about to be backed over the barricade of the hull. "I did it to you once before, I'll do it again! Just like old times, Capt'!" He rushed forward, tapping the ecomancer on a shoulder. "You take over." He bid an acknowledging Tula a nod before using a baton to clunk the sallow foot of the unyielding adversary, who was restraining Ioz with a clawed mitt. Bloth shouted and dropped the wheezing prey to the ground. Ren moved in like a pursing hawk, ready to destroy.

"You lied! You said you wouldn't do me any more harm, kreld-eater!" Ren grit his teeth in disgust. His merciless scream was clattering among the shining slicer of glimmer that he thrust against the oppressive brunt.

"I said I wouldn't do you any more harm. Those Treasures are mine, boy!" Bloth maintained a remorseless uproar. He gripped Ren's wrist with a crushing grapple. Ren howled and flailed fierce legs at the smashing attacker. The blond's vision became blurry, clasp on the Sword enduring.

"Thank you, Ren and Bloth, for fighting so I can take the Treasures from you!" Stray lightning flashed as The Dark Dweller rose up in the water, all-encompassing and scalding through the blaring wind. "You foolish vermin! There was never safety on your Wraith, Son of Primus! I could have sunk you both whenever I desired! It is only by my mercy you are alive, as I can destroy all but the Treasures of Rule!" Ren's face shocked, horror-struck as the shuddersome and putrid liquid started to gobble the hem of the cruiser, tearing pulp out of the Maelstrom as if it were comprised of threaded swabbing-rags. Parts of it poured over the planks, a gaping fissure shaped between the fracturing planks and widened where a perse Constrictus awaited. Devious attendants from the deep outlined the brink, verging for the makeshift arena. Globs of demolishing slime fired, consuming fodder from the vessel's fullness.

"Enough is enough! I have seen enough with these jitatan dark disciples on my jitatan ship!" The appalled Bloth rambunctiously hauled Ren and himself off-aim from the dark water spurts, toting the aristocrat over limb. He stole Ren away.

"Someone needs to be steering, we're overrun!" Tula bellowed from heaving away an intruder, only to be clout down by another pair and the vicious ex-tactician. Dark Mantus darted a sleek cutter into the panel, an eyelash away from the ecomancer's forehead. She clawed her way up to her knees, flicking the swipe away with a clack. She scrambled up as the route drew nearer to the grounds of the shore. Outside the lighthouse she focused upon an adult and a younger man, both with spilling locks like hers. They were attempting to haul an older woman and many girls. "Father and brother! Mother and sisters!" She anxiously called, too far away to aid the spell-inducing family, who were giving their all for the good of Octopon and the dear planet. She leapt for the helm, burning a triad of decayed worshipers with the glassine crystal. She tripped and skidded to her knees. The craft was ready to overturn. "Ay chunga lunga! Someone! Take the wheel!" She let out with an exerting pant, reaching the limit of her ardor. She shrieked. Disciple Mantus enclosed a steel palm around her ankle. She was lassoed closer to doom.

"Outta the way, ye scummy sponge-domes! Come on, you can do better than that!" Zoolie tempted the succession of hybrid troublemakers, beating away the plague one at a time with the clunky bastion. The creak sounded and his foot slipped, dipping into a nook. Before he felt wood slap against his head, he witnessed Konk taking over and driving away from disaster. More assailants were diving down from the sails aloft. Golden sparks sizzled and the deadly hull wafted to the brim of the bulwark, curving in a frightening rotation.

"Watch out, wench!" The stray sailor zoomed past Tula, tangling to expand the sail. Three more pirates stabilized the mast, bringing about the floater's eventual righting.

"We'll all go down with the ship because of you! Let...go! It won't work in your hands! The Dark Dweller is going to win because of your jitatan...selfishness!" Ren wrenched with a dying pitch, racking for the Treasure as the dual enemies scuffled. The fluctuation of dark water renewed an infected Constrictus, a hostile foot skinned the inferior opponent from his wobble and sunk on a resisting skull. Bloth bent a knee to tug on the Treasure as his dark pet screeched from it's cavern and gnashed a bursting maw at a pair of navy legs. Even at the crunching tube of black fangs arising off the cleft brim of his pit, the Pirate Lord intended to exert his clouted muscle until a surrender of glimmering prize tore from a dangling Ren.

"Swallow your own mudworm-handle, Blue-Lips!" Niddler swept for Ren, alleviating the overburdened tension. He flapped to leading heights as Bloth wrenched his tight knuckles to seize the jewel within Ren's fist. The Dark Constrictus surfaced with a grinding pharynx to devour everything in reach of it's sucking and snapping thorns. Niddler threshed indomitably to thwart clutches that would inevitably drag them both into the pit of hot breath, the avian's wings broke hold and returned a youthful voyager to the edge. Ren somersaulted to the defensive.

The platform underneath their brawl would have cast their clatter onto the contaminated torrent as the Constrictus mangled floorboards. Wind slashed and chiseled, chopping like knives against the rivals. The colossal pillager swatted a hulking palm at the juvenile fighter, attempting to break him off.

"Never in the twenty seas, Bloth!" Ioz boldly insisted, ignoring the pain from his side to dock Ren a line out of splintering timber in the middle of the monster-transport. He slashed with an abandoned cutlass, one still containing a piercing threshold. The flat rocked and the challengers settled on the floor, no longer in immediate danger. Ren and Bloth inhaled, the typhoon continued to whirl and fray.

"You can steal the Treasure from me, but you can't steal it from the Dark Dweller. You had better give it back, now, unless you want to join your trusty friend." Ren cynically communed with the plundering warlord as he staggered to steady on nagging legs. The aspiring ruler pointed to the stampeding swordsman of a greasy mane emerging from the starboard, Tula quickly vaulted out of the instant line of aim. Disciple Mantus stormed into the close zone, a lengthy sickle dicing into lumber before a spooked Bloth. The jilted Captain released the Treasure.

"Thanks a lot, you bloated dartha-eel." The prince graciously and bitterly thanked as he snapped away the shimmering beam. He dashed for parts of the erratic ship where too much of the atrocious sap was overflowing. "We have to contain this!" He mentally withered.

"Uhh, Ren, we have a problem!" From the heavens and overtop the high riggings, Niddler sung a calamitous song. The monkeybird floated down, carting Avagon whom in turn carried the Treasure-Crown. The monkeybird gestured to an extravagant marine-twister brewing, comprised fully of the darkened substance. Some of the zealots were exiting the barely floating deck, others continued to raid.

"Here, Ren! We'll need to centralize our forces if we are to defend against the Dark Dweller!" Avagon called out to the brave apprentice on the deck, passing over the 13th Treasure of Rule. Ren remounted it to his forehead as Bloth diverted his attention.

"Be gone with you all!" Ren hastened to drive the disciples from their landing, scalding the spoiled flesh with the great weapon and cleaning the liquid chaos from the floor. Much of the horrible horde hopped overboard with the combined efforts. "Now to get us out of this wind and steer us back to the lighthouse before this storm gets any worse." He effectively willed, affirming to speed to the wheel. He skipped over the wreckage of the half-broken boards laying underfoot.

"Oh, Tula." Bloth grinned as he stepped toward the ecomancer, charming with a cunning lull. "Do you really want this puny boy to rule the land? Why don't you join me. I'll give you everything you ask for when Mer is all mine." He prodigally laughed, proposing his offer. Tula grimaced with disgust.

"You have to be kidding, Bloth! Why would I join you?! Ren will save Mer and you'll be punished for what you've done!" Tula scorned with abhorrence, backing nervously away. Ren instantly shot back around.

"Leave her alone, Bloth!" Ren screamed with a furious upset, blocking Tula's path. "Stop your damage right now! She doesn't have to answer to you and neither does anyone else! Stop this powerlust, the dark water is our true enmy!" With a severing rage not witnessed before, he demanded in the gale of a ruthless lion, everyone stopped to shoot a temporal glance. Twain sails flapped above, torn from electric sunders and the now steeping hurricane.

"No, Ren! He's trying to tra-" Tula tried to stammer before she could speak no longer. The competitor reached for something on a crate behind him, Bloth cleaved up a hand-sized but intensely glowing fixture, likely exceeding all light boundaries. Tula shrieked as a mystic whirlpool was set loose through the sky.

"Tula, no!" Niddler boisterously screeched, he darted in front of Bloth to attempt to stop the emergency that had already begun to occur. Unfortunately, his wings lagged too immensely. Tula's standing form became limp, her head was placed down and subservient. Bloth had transformed into a duplicate of Ren.

"Now, Tula. Make Ren obey his new master!" Bloth diabolically laughed. He clutched the emitting lantern with a scrolled map pressed inside like a Key and maintained it over his own skull as Tula knelt obediently, she had started to gleam with energy. Ren, and the rest of the crew on the vessel beamed and bowed before Bloth. Niddler flapped his feathers and fluttered down to respectfully crane his neck to the floor. The Sword within Ren's palm had started to seep in a graying aura. The immoral pirate chuckled as lightning flashed through the sky. Dark Mantus and the remaining dark disciples willingly attended him. "Mantus, you're bowing to me too! This is the potion Morpho was working on to enslave the Chosen Ecomancer, Tulina's, powers to properly convert the Treasures of Rule away from Ren's dominion by breaking the Seal Supreme Ecomancer Sugii placed over the Compass. Clever, the ink of the Arakna map was inscribed with drops from the original River of Rule Mizar left in his wake on Qui-Qua. Hmm, I suppose those slime-brains were already under the control of Morpho and the Dark Dweller so additional eco-essence was not needed. Let's see if it works!" He experimentally amused. "Ren. Come here and answer to me!" He commanded with a ecstatic frolic.

"Yes, Lord Bloth, My Master and King of Mer." Ren obligingly answered with dilated and lifeless eyes. He groveled before the heel of the identical overlord.

"Twist my soul! It worked! It actually worked!" Bloth bellowed with an gladdened chortle, near to doing a jig on the rocking Maelstrom. "With Ren as my slave, Mer is totally mine!" He burbled with a cheering merriment.

"Wait, Bloth." Ren ceremoniously besought.

"Hmm?" Bloth leaned closer, puzzled by the sudden request.

"I have to tell you something, about the Treasures of Rule." Ren humbly divulged, reverentially admiring the authority.

"What is it, boy?" Bloth solicited with anticipation, hardly able to contain himself.

"The Sword of Primus..." Ren dragged.

"Yes?" Bloth awaited.

"Already has Tula's ecomantic energy inside of it." Ren demurely told as his eyes shot up. He smirked. The remaining Treasures flew out of Bloth's hand and the saboteur hollered. Ren caught the Treasures with an agile flip of his wrist and palm, anything evil Tula's powers had done to them now erased.

"What?!" Bloth shouted with fury and trepidation.

"So now that's over." Ren said lackadaisically. He slung the Sword and knocked the equal enemy on the ground. Tula and Ioz returned to their original states. Dark Disciple Mantus instantly attacked Bloth.

"Aggghhh!" Bloth tripped to the floor with an infuriated gnarl. The blade of the thin apostate served his neck, Bloth howled. He instantaneously wondered how it was possible for him to make such a noise, he stumbled to his hefty feet. The Pirate Lord gazed at his two pasty hands and awed from the rejuvenation. He stroked his neck, which was completely intact and returned to a prime state. "By the abyss of Mer! I've become invincible, like Ren!" He maniacally rejoiced in a hideous celebration. "Morpho must have created something to drain the effectiveness from the boy! Now Mer truly will be mine!" He gleaned with a confident carriage, promptly busting the Mantus-Disciple away from his vicinity and pointing his sword at Ren. The vicious grin stew his corpulent lips.

"Oh no!" Tula screamed. Ren and Ioz gaped with aghast eyes. Avagon and Zoolie halted their position. Niddler pitched forward, flying too close to the rest of the group and stunted from shock.

"The means, we're done for!" Ren sorrowed in repulsion, recoiling and despising the words coming from his mouth. "How?!" He stuttered with imminent horror and confusion. He noticed something upon the crown, a fragment of the Compass was missing. "Part of the Compass is missing, then that means..." He could not fathom.

"Did your lizardlubbing friend did say something about being lured into a trap meant for us, by a piece of the Treasure on a dagron's mane?" Ioz grimly mentioned.

"This is why the Dark Dweller wanted the Compass!" Niddler squeaked in the sky.

"What, Niddler?" Ren puzzled at the proclamation.

"It's part of the 14th Treasure, Kayraadin!" Tula followed up, leaping forward.

"Ouch!" Ren sharply winced, feeling a pain gouge his arm. Niddler's claw swooped past.

"You still have it, Ren!" Niddler, about to issue a genial apology, startled with a striking conclusion. He gawked at Ren's scratchless arm.

"I do, but I know someone who doesn't!" Ren instantly charged forward with a roar to attack Bloth.

"He was only able to drain some of it away!" Niddler splendidly reported.

"Let's hope that's enough!" Ioz encouragingly appended, he arranged to cover Ren from behind the wall of the flaring struggle.

"There can be only one true Master of the Treasures of Rule!" Bloth erupted with an enraged wrath at the approaching youth, weapon piercing the atmosphere. Bolts of electric charge smashed in the encircling wind.

"There can be only one, and it will never be you, Bloth!" Ren yelled, he stormed forward with a leap. He crossed the grand Sword of Primus with the unstoppable plunderer. He tossed the glittering diamond to Tula and watched her catch the gem to sear the reviving mob. Ren slammed at the impossible antagonist with a stalwart might. The enemies slipped to opposite sides, carving through the other when they again clacked metal. The current barreled in a violent eruption, tipping the ship deeper into the gulf of Octopon. Noises spattered up the siding hull.

"You stole my potion!" Morpho gurgled unpredictably, supported by the framework of the railing. "Now I'm going to steal you! The Dark Dweller will appreciate your servitude!" He declared with a malicious hiss, he tried to kidnap Bloth overboard. Bloth then powered a backhanded fist to the undead cultist and clout the screeching servant away. More zealots looped the area, falling to the efforts of the persisting five. Morpho lunged for the Captain.

"Get off of me! Or I'll turn you into reef-pulp!" Bloth threatened, chucking Morpho away from him. "Now." He signaled of malevolence. He prodded his steel directly at Ren, urging the adolescent to trail against an adjacent halyard. "Meet your undoing, Ren! And, that of your friends!" He treacherously chuckled as he pulled the loose rope tight as it wrapped and restrained the feuding boy. He pinned Ren to the floor with his driving razor. He then set his sights on Ioz with particular regard for Tula. He grasped a soakingscoo-scale from an abutting barrel and chased the ecomancer.

"Not that!" Tula helplessly squealed as she was trying to summon her vivacity, but her force would not come. Ioz and Zoolie enclosed from the back, ending with mutual slap into each other.

"Tula is the daughter of Supreme ecomancer Sugii! How foolish of me to spend years plundering Andorus for the Door to the Treasures of Rule when she is right here!" Bloth rolled Ioz to the floor, hoisting a bin over the strewn man with a cackling gusto. He seized Tula by the slight wrist, who resisted with every iota. She was then locked in an embrace of sweaty ashen, oodles of her will draining to avoid the scoundrel.

"Keep your jitatan dartha-grogging hands off her!" Ren exploded in flabbergasted horror from his contained position, at last rocking free from his bindings against the slicing fixture. He did not need to do more when both Morpho and Dark Mantus clobbered Bloth at the same moment. The kelp-wrapped soakingscoo sailed off the board. Punches and weapons were flung and Ren paled from the sight of the three sparring evil forces. While the two minions were trying to retain the giant, Ren toddled to an upright posture. He unevenly swayed with uncertainty whether he should move in. Bloth shook the revolting team back into the drift. The dual rivals clashed for each other once more.

The two men were in a deadlock, clapping away at the countering tension. Ren spiraled around, again endeavoring to rapidly invade the cumbersome zone. "Ren, look out!" Tula counseled in a alarmed yell, but it was too late. Bloth had pried the momentous blade from the boy's digits and used his strength to flip Ren off the stern of the frigate. Ren only gripped on with hands to the side of the hull but he was slipping from his other, which had been cracked open. Dark water splashed below. Her fatigued legs would not move in time for her no matter how much she wanted them to, she skipped her own Treasure to Ioz nearby. Unfortunately, she had estimated too far. The pane careered past her debilitated crewmate and parked, thoroughly under Bloth's toe. Niddler clawed at a fanatic that was attempting to rend the monkeybird to fluff.

"I'm the only one who will be ruler of this world, Son Of Primus!" Bloth blared aloud and laughed with a vengeance as he handled the Sword of Primus in one hand and wrapped the wrenching wrist in the second. The tussle with the persevering Ren had caused him to drop his own weapon. Ren tried to fuse his hand on the hard ledge of the ship as it rocked turbulently, dark disciples were walking on the flogging substance to catch up with him and the evil black was nipping at his flailing feet. "After I dispose of you, your ecomancer should provide me with enough labor to aid my efforts to possess the Treasures of Rule. Of course, this is all naught when I have what I came for! You have but one last opportunity to join me!" Bloth haggled his lethal proposition, at Ren's deathstare.

"By my sword you won't! You'll never rule Mer, Bloth!" Ioz bellowed with a furious tempest of raw anger at the beastly Captain. Using Bloth's fallen rapier, he stampeded with all his hardiness at the ponderous raider against the railing of the vessel. He was pushing the wide pirate back with all the power that he could muster. His legs were hooked out from under him, he buckled to the floor.

"No answer? Very well, stubborn Son of Primus!" Bloth snarled savagely, giving Ren the final push him off. He backed away from the ledge.

"How dare you attack Ren!" Tula screamed as she diverted her cutlass at the defending wrongdoer, crowding him back more. She forced him away with all the capacity she carried behind her slash. She hearkened Ren's cry and a rearing up of dark water, he fell in! "Ren, no!" Tula despondently riled.

"Ren!" Ioz shone his horrified exigency as he yelled out, sadness was present when he heard the boy's voice disappear.

"What were you saying again, Ioz?" Bloth growled as he wielded the dusky Sword of Primus at the two sailors of the Wraith. "That I won't Rule Mer?" He rumbled as he endured to drive the both of them from his midst. Ioz and Tula were increasingly impaired by his vigor.

"Tula! The dark water...it's the only way!" Ioz forewent to a desperate strategy. His eyes twinged to the atramentous uprising behind the insurmountable marauder.

"The Treasure!" Tula argued the only fatal flaw.

"We just have to hope we can get it back, otherwise he's going to kill us all!" Ioz revealed with an unpleasant insight.

"But Ren used to get tired...right, so can't we make Bloth tired out? What if knocking him in destroys all of us anyway...what if there is a chance Ren is still...what if Bloth will hurt him down there, forever?" Tula assumed an essence of misery to the red core. She petrified in her steps, limbs shunted and refused to turn. Ioz drew Bloth's sword, even on a swollen rib.

"Ren was Ren, Tula. This is Bloth, and he has the Treasure of Rule inside of him. We have no chance. I threw my life on the line for the Quest because I grew to respect Ren and his crew, but I can't ever respect Ren's foolishness of saving Bloth." Ioz propelled on mucked boots with a revitalized purpose, knowing this would be his last mutiny. Tula stepped into her ecomancy-enchantment stance with a chary sigh, one which grew to an insatiable sob. The charge of the duo devastated by tragedy of the Quest having come to this point. No return to a stable Mer would be possible, at least not in the corruption of King Primus's son.

PART ? Captain Bloth's revenge

The infamous Pirate Lord and a well of devotees from the sludge were marching in and cornering yet again. Konk and some of the other humans were affixed in the shadow of the villainous murderers. Avagon and Zoolie had hastily arranged with crash-and-burn facades at the teeming overflow.

"You forgot one thing, Bloth!" Suddenly, a voice impaled the airway.

"What?!" The pernicious man fluxed. The shipmates' faces lit up with hope.

"I still have the 13th Treasure of Rule!" Ren released a powerful message and he snatched the golden ring of the crown from his head, lashing it at the oppressive disciples and the black abyss. They retreated under his efficacious direction. He flung himself up and over the wall of the quaking ship and within Bloth's shock, managed to salvage the Sword of Primus from the unwieldy tyrant. Ioz and Tula joined his wrangle. The three of them backed the iniquitous captain up against the banister of the ship, batting their weapons against the contrary blade that was reclaimed in haste. Bloth was forced to shift his heel from the glass flat underfoot. Bloth swiped his massive cutlass, trying to defend to keep from falling over the edge of his leviathan-railing. Ren recovered the 12th Treasure and smashed his magical blade with all he could render.

"Ren, you will not tell me my only destiny is to be defeated by a worthless boy!" Bloth raved as he burned, beset in overwhelming catastrophe in his loss. That insane iris of his flared gold like a captain in the last surviving rescue dory staring down the gullet of a Delphian shark. "Climb that mast!" Only by the invasion of his racking stomps he chased Ren against the encircling Constrictus rupture and heaved his vigor to the prince's deflecting shoulders. Ren stood in defiance and resisted going farther. "Do as I say." Bloth produced cruel foul and threatening slice at a chained woman, Solia.

"No, Bloth, your destiny is not to be defeated by me. Your destiny is to use the Treasures to restore Mer, and not for yourself." Ren backed on to the teetering mast, standing overtop hollow miasma from the beast's lair as he listened to the swinging. The singular halyard supported the weight of the post, erecting a bone-bridge through the wreckage and bound the topsail riggings from the slope of rubble in the worm's den underneath. Ren reversed on the loosely broken column perched too high to touch the Dweller Constrictus's lagoon of dark water, awing the hungry reverberations that shook under his feet time and again. "Very cheerful position you have me in, Bloth. It's too bad you can't enjoy the gorgeous view up here with me." Ren solaced in the complication Kuunda had brought him to. It was a very good thing Bloth could not slash the cords without being on the collapsing mast with him.

"Very cheerful indeed, my boy. I'm sure your perspective is magnificent, and it's about to get even more exciting...from my front-row seat." Berserk wrath flooded in a bloodthirsty maniac at the deviated base yet his whirlwind temper dallied as if he were conserving speed for the right moment to strike. Bloth motioned to a boom break spinning in the sour air that had been clipped out of lock. Like a roulette wheel were eight sectors, one remained clasped to the mainstay. From the silk belt gleamed a secondary cutlass, sharpness speckled on the siphoned tip. Bloth unsheathed and aimed.

"So my chances of survival are...seven out of..." Ren studied the rotation from where he gripped on, he carefully climbed for the crow's nest but such a feat was made insufficient by his angle. Niddler gave a striving Ioz and Tula a boost from the distant lip of the Constrictus chasm in a struggle to wrestle Bloth before his chance to launch. Misfits of the Wraith's trio collided with shouts of haste for him to slide down as Ioz successfully chopped for Solia's run. Tula knocked free of hideous vice, then all effort ended.

"Eight." Bloth landed his mark.

The Captain's sport stopped hasty as the stakes were drawn and done. The blade submerged but had not rooted deep enough into the grain to loosen the mast. Ren braced on when a fierce gust tilted his prop, rolling the hero safely to the chute of sailcloth. By mere chance of fate, the boat doused under a fickle zephyr in that instant and the nasty thug was left hanging from the ridge by only an anemic hand.

"This is for everyone you hurt, fish-lips!" The escaped Niddler cawed from the air and he swished close to the struggling blackguard. The flap of his wings was almost all it took for Bloth to lose his balance and fall overboard into the murky ebb below, lessened by the combined forces of Ioz and Tula, along with the greatly invigorated Ren. Were it not for Disciple Mantus who dealt the final jolt with a pouncing ambush, the Pirate Lord would have still stood strong.

"Son of Primus! Help me!" Bloth screamed as he was being consumed by the dark water. It lashed in strands at his arms and bulk, dragging him under. Zealot Mantus snarled, hacking at the surviving fighters on the pier.

"May Kuunda show mercy to you, Bloth!" Ren shouted in return, he kept his word to the enemy who tried to kill him and his friends one too many times.

"Wait, Ren! Please listen! I only want to have some rule over this world, I'll give you the Treasures of Rule. If you only let me have a portion of Mer for myself! I won't do any more harm to you or your friends! I don't want to be eaten by this inborn curse! Is it wrong to not want to die from being slowly torn up horribly from the inside?" Bloth ferociously tried to bargain.

"It has nothing to do with that, I offered you my help! I know you don't feel sorry, but this time you've done worse than trying to harm me or break our promise. You would have killed Ioz without a second thought, and Tula too if you didn't need her abilities to properly use the Treasures! I find it demeaning to save your gelatinous heel, when you would subject anyone to what would someday become of you!" Ren belted back from above, Bloth continued to tread in the unlit. Shrieks and trawls wrung from the ensnaring trap, impending a soon demise in it's nest. He couldn't shun away anyone who turned to him for aid, Bloth was different however. His dual morals conflicted, and he would have to set one aside.

"Your dear uncle?" Bloth craftily haggled.

"None of mine." Ren shot two glances behind and moved on.

"Well, Ren. It appears you've finally become a man, too bad we've sold our souls for it!" His plan to manipulate Ren thwarted, the revolting evildoer admitted defeat from the water after concluding with a spiteful heckle. He was sore after his foiled intention to take only the Treasures from Ren, but he had forgotten the prince's loyalty. If Bloth had apologized to any perhaps things would have been different, but now he would sink in his arrogance over a faroff struggle from the past.

"No, you have!" Ren lambasted with an appalling fury. "I'll set you free and what? You attack everyone else? No, Bloth. You're finished." Ren bid last and harsh words, cautiously diverging away from the fiend who was bad to the end.

"I wonder what your father would think about leaving me to sink, good Prince of Octopon." Bloth hummed that familiar tune in lapse to himself, Ren paused and shook.

"Don't listen to him, Ren!" Tula bitterly called out from slamming a rigorous pair of boots into the scraggy disciple.

"Ioz?" Ren asked with an authorizing quandary.

"Let him sink." Ioz earnestly affirmed. He made the choice he knew Ren couldn't make without his companionship.

"Pull yourself up, you scot-pango Fezwa-slime!" Ren trembled in terror, he threw Bloth a rope in anguish. He went back on his promise, and yet he couldn't stand the pleading any longer.

"Will we all die in these faults, Ren? By Kuunda, you've sold your soul to destroy me!" Bloth's grin perked as he took due advantage of Ren's generosity. Pulling his berth, he begged for one more favor. Ioz served the line. Ren showed his back.

"Rest in dark waves, Bloth, you pitiful sea-slug." Ioz saluted to his former Captain's pathetic down course. He turned his neck around along with Ren. After Bloth was overthrown, Konk waddled away.

"Now, it's over." Ren watched his fading way, heart iced to gray.

"Are we done here?" Ioz whispered crisply.

"I know Bloth wasn't just a bully to everyone. I know why he is doing what he is doing now, but that doesn't make it right." Ren lamented another lost, looming on an overlook where the Dark Constrictus had split the Maelstrom down the middle. Ioz worked at the clamp to pick Solia out of the manacles and hurry his joining patrol.

"On my word, kill boy and crew!" The sneaky Konk snickered cunningly to the few underlings that survived Bloth's reign. "Now Konk take over!" He let out an entertained noise, underhandedly trying to get the pirate crew to attack the heroes.

"What was that, piglet? Mind telling me whether my jitatan ears just heard what I think they did?" Ioz inquired of the runt-pirate as he lifted him up by the shirt collar and scowled. Konk nervously chuckled.

"I think we have a mutinous piglet in our midst!" Tula smugly brushed over and mocked in a coy manner the now-withdrawing Konk.

Ren threateningly flourished his sword at the buccaneers surrounding the captured Konk, and then at Konk himself. "Now, Konk." Ren started to smile as he confidently fronted to the gnome. "You should address your Captain with some respect. Since Bloth is no longer the Captain of the Maelstrom, I, Ren, Son of Primus am Captain by default, and my first order as your Captain is that you steer 'Her to the lighthouse so we can save our friends and inhabitants of Mer from the dark water...unless of course, you'd like off my ship, piglet." Ren smirked cleverly at the shrimp, who scanned around at the surrounding sea of ebony and then at Ren's glowing blade. The cowardly imbecile grinned anxiously and nodded his head in compliance. Ioz put him down with a smile as Konk and Bloth's former crewmen set course for shore.

Ren revolved away from the previous interruption, he glared up into the beclouded and storming sky. He listened to several patters of feet from behind and he then needed to quickly flash back around, more dark disciples were boarding the ship. His mouth drooped as he thrust the 13th Treasure of Rule at the advancing agitators. He had driven only two of the followers to recession. "Ioz! Tula!" Ren rung out to the complement of his Treasure-bearing friends, he granted Ioz the mystic metal and tossed the diamond to Tula while he retained the crown himself.

"These kreld-eaters are all for us!" Tula vivified as she sailed in with a kick, taking out three of the converts. More were forthcoming. She embedded the 12th Treasure of Rule into the skin of one freak and it shrieked as it felt the burn, then retreating. More dreary invaders were climbing up the hull.

"I've got this one!" Ioz powered out, slashing away at the bleak-embodied enemies with thumps and clatters. He wielded the Sword, which did not shimmer in his hands, but functioned as much like a Treasure as the others. Many of the disciples fled away. He crinkled his neck over, being in earshot of the next mishap.

"Now!" Konk motioned as he pointed at the mighty team, a few loyalist men from behind him attempted to unleash the onslaught. Ren immediately rushed in and clenched the piglet in a sturdy chokehold. Ioz and Tula succored the other two. Niddler fluttered down to face the craven ex-cohort of Bloth's crew.

"Guess who is going to watch you now. You're not getting away, pig-face!" On his haunches the monkeybird taunted the squirming runt with a prideful puff. The hateful midget frowned.

"Have fun, Niddler." Ren playfully joked and walked away as his bestfriend taught the misanthrope of the flying species a lesson not soon forgotten. The vile cultists were continuing, the seemingly endless sea of the black-blooded zombie assailants all beelined straight for the ship. "Time to take these dartha-eels back home. Ready, Tula?" Ren questioned the capable partner at his side.

"I wouldn't miss it for Mer!" Tula proclaimed as she conjured a spectacular lighting storm in a rainbow of the elements, both fire and water combined with the spirit of the ground to the sky above. It crashed upon the dark disciples that were aspiring to take control, throwing many off the bow. One by one, the loathsome beings toppled. She lashed around, summoning her newfound greatness. The roaring and crashing sounded while Ren busted away with the crown to squelch the dark minions. Ioz ripped the extravagant blade, repelling even more of the maniacs.

"You!" Morpho's evil form wheezed and surfaced from behind, he wrapped a tentacle around the throat of the blond aristocrat. "Not happening, Son of Primus. The light of the Treasures and everything with them will be destroyed, forevermore! Now you will join my Master!" The wicked creature raved as he tried to force Ren to partake of the shade, pressing the chalice to the savior's mouth.

"No! Kreld-eater!" Ren cursed and thrashed against the monster, he despaired when the gem had fallen from his head.

"Ren, no!" Tula screamed arduously, she had proceeded to slide into flimsy with her expenditure. She endeavored to run forward but tripped, meeting the end of her plight against the floorboards. She dropped her Treasure.

"I'll get it!" Ioz vowed with all reputable intention, flashing the edge against the manifold enemies that were advancing. He drew back at the swarm, collapsing and bumping his head. "Chungo lungo!" He swore, frantically scrambling to emerge. The pain in his torso spurred like a nail.

"Aahahahaha!" Morpho laughed as the morbid liquid dripped closer to the defender's jaw.

Niddler witnessed from the sidelines, it would have to be now or never. "I'm here, Ren! These kreld-faced losers are going to see what it's like to drink their own poison!" Niddler chattered as he picked up into the air and soared. He drifted downward on the Treasure Tula had lost. He scratched away at an approaching parasite with all his valor. Regrettably, the lackey chucked him away.

"Niddler!" Tula called. Just as she had done so, Niddler rebounded and plowed into the harmful devotee like an airborne torpedo. The fanatic plunged from the deck, back to home in obsolete darkness. The monkeybird grasped the Treasure in claw and scurried toward Ren on robust wings. Reaching the impending disciple-leader, he shoved the shining gem into the arm of the disgraceful mutant. Morpho wailed and jumped ship.

"Niddler! You saved me! You did it!" Ren laughed and hugged the monkeybird warmly, lifting him up. He gave the fleece of red a pat on the head. Niddler viewed up boldly, bestowing a strong impression for once in his monkeybird life.

"I'm not afraid any more! I'm not even hungry!" Niddler proudly announced. He fluttered his wings and carried Ren back to the other two of the immediate group who had subdued the trespassers.

"Great work, monkeybird. You may even be muscling in on my impetus, Niddler." Ioz graciously charmed, showing considerable respect for the once weak-minded avian. Tula daintily gleamed.

"Now we can take the Treasures to the lighthouse and then everything will be as it should be." Ren happily congratulated his good feathered-friend. He stroked the fluffy head as the winged-wonder displayed a smiling beak.

Ren pattered off with Niddler to go back to the wheel, intent on going home. However, his attention had to bend fast. He listened upon a wail in the water of the Dark Constrictus domain, his eyes darted at the dreadful source. On the plague, savage believers clustered around in a cultlike ring. Bloth, barely hanging on, lingered to a dark disciple who walked upon the field of shroud.

"Now you are ready to become a dark disciple, Bloth!" Morpho ominously forecast, he walked through the deadening rink of black for the center. The apostles were swarming around and ready to consume him.

"Noy jitat! Does he ever stop this?!" Ioz obstinately blurted, anxiety and grief present.

"Maybe it wasn't such a good idea to knock him into the dark water after all!" Niddler squawked out, uneasy in the air.

"We have to fight him again now! And this time it could be worse! Ren, you'll need to cover for us, I don't think I can will essence anymore." Tula expressed, throughly worn-out as well as disheartened. Some time ago it had become apparent that Ren was the only one not almost completely exhausting himself at the end, Tula's own fatigue and Ioz's snap limited them to a supportive quality at best and an overthrow target at worst. Not even Zoolie and Avagon were retaining their diehard composition.

"Don't worry, we still have the Treas-" Ren impended to warn but before he could finish, a hostile cyclone peaked around the Maelstrom that was unknowingly whipping farther into the epicenter of the windstorm. Shredded sails threshed as wood and bone creaked, the enduring harness of the lethal draft propelled the dwindling base askew. He and Tula were bumped off and overboard into the convergence of desolate waters. Ioz soon followed, the downpour of disciples were consolidating up the bulwarks once more. The ship had bucked under the force.

"Ren! Tula! Ioz!" The monkeybird sorrowfully screeched from the sky, he saw his friends being eaten away by the absorbing spots of the stygian lava. The pervading Treasures still rested on the ship.

"Niddler!" Ren screamed inadequately, dark water had begun to drown him. He squirmed to keep afloat among the horrible and encasing sloe. He witnessed Bloth in a dooming prison on the serpent's spate, eying with a bestial grin.

"This ain't over Ioz!" Zoolie hurried out away from the stern, engaging a party of visitors. Avagon took up the slack. "I'll try to steer 'Her close!" He appended to the trio in the waves. "Quit your gaada sword-swallowing!" He bitterly dismissed with another deflect of Dark Mantus's downward strike, sweating to reach the helm.

"I'll find some rope!" Avagon issued with swollen eyes. "I want those sails patched, pronto! Use your shirts and britches if you have to!" She swooned back to the trouble at hand. This time, Niddler did not need convincing.

"Bloth not die in dark water." Konk fearfully blurted.

"What was that?" Avagon approached as she turned a peculiar eye to the runt.

"He hear rumor. Mantus and me find Spell Scroll we don't tell Bloth about twelve year ago. Bloth know about North River of Toishuok and Treasure because he trick Mantus into telling him secret if Bloth don't throw Mantus to Constrictus. Mantus think Bloth serious because Bloth know Mantus let Mizar go from Maelstrom before Ioz and Zoolie big mutiny. Dark water can't swallow Bloth until Bloth lose Treasure in body. It merge with him now, like Kayraadin invincible until hair catch in Ruukaana meltdown with Mantus. Treasure leave her but Mantus and Zoolie not know!" Konk unwittingly explained.

"Fascinating, Konk." Avagon discreetly assessed. "Now tell us more." She plucked the blabbermouth to her, threatening him with the sword.

"I'll save you, I promise I will! I'm not giving up now, this is my destiny!" Niddler brashly blustered through the soaring air, all fear and cowardice vanished from his being. This would be his one chance to prove to both himself and Mer what monkeybirds were capable of. He would not let his friends down, not ever. He squawked as he launched for a clouding disciple who was trying to gather the Treasure with a separate entity. Valiantly, he tussled the abomination over with his claws, charring the freed Treasure to the skin of the impurity. The angered radical hooked him by the tail, but Niddler had already preempted the Treasure into custody. He forcibly kicked away the invader with a prodigious struggle, then he took to the air. He flew straight, lifting his burdening plumage through the suppressed atmosphere. He glided for Ren, who had been about to go under. He glanced around and saw Tula and Ioz not greatly behind. He painstakingly dove down into the imperiling black, ferrying the exorbitantly heavy prince back to the ship first. Ren relieved the magnificent Sword from the floor and commenced the defensive. Niddler swooped over. He passed dangerously close to Bloth and the munching Constrictus on the return but he succeeded in rescuing Ioz, who he dropped off on the brink. Tula had been farther away, eyes almost touched the event horizon by now. Courageously, he swept as fast as his tormenting wings would go. He just made it. He plunged the Treasure into the ooze, freeing the final victim of the hopeless beyond. He carried up Tula with the little bit of energy that abode underneath his feathers, the team would soon be reunited.

From the encroaching ship, Ren watched his dear colleague being released. He scraped with an impeding zombie. Ioz, next to him, beat a Treasure at another head. "Niddler should get back with Tula soon." The burly nobleman worried. More enemies would soon be upon them and Ren would need all the help he could get as Ioz distracted himself by punting away another cultist.

"Bye bye birdie!" Ren spied around at Konk in the corner, whom he heard say the curious thing. He did not begin to panic until he spotted the gruesome sight in front of him.

"No!" Ren boiled over with a horrified and hapless dynamism. Tula had been trapped, adjacent to the deck and outside of the puddle of unstoppable mud. Bloth's pasty hand clamped around her ankle, the cold brute's other arm curbed the monkeybird by the tail.

"Ren, I've got this one! Run away!" Niddler cawed daringly from his entangled proximity. It had not been until he felt the blanched fist of ice cement around him when he understood he could not escape.

"Looks like you won't be winning after all, Son of Primus! Not when your precious friends and Treasure sink to the bottom of the abyss in my Constrictus's stomach! Maybe I'll let one of them go, if you plead for their lives." Bloth's raucous and crushing laugh echoed in the surrounding area, a fat boot supported his weight on a highrise of jetsam.

"Let them go, Bloth!" Ren crashed with a furious uproar. He bolted forward and with another leap, would vault over the railing blockading the endless ditch. Something pulled him back by his wrist.

"That's dark water Ren. If you get drawn in to it or swallowed by the Constrictus, we won't be able to do anything with this horde!" The timorous breath of Ioz ushered him back. Ren tried to war against the presence of realism who stopped him from jumping.

"No, fish-lips. Ren will win and you will lose." Niddler's enraged vocal asserted the imminent truth. He fluttered with the remaining strength and time he could compel, staring and wishing death upon the black-hearted ruin. He dove down, biting and clamping on the hand that kept and attempted to drag away Tula. He bravely tossed the Treasure to the ecomancer. Bloth had angrily pushed her away, the dark disciples swarmed on her as she regained the Treasure and scaled to the planking threshold.

"Bold monkeybird, but remember who has you by the tail!" Bloth evilly spurned, keeping Niddler in an unrelenting grasp. The monkeybird flapped down to rest on the shoulders of the cruel and reveling saboteur, the mount under his wings at last giving out.

"Yeah...? Well, I guess we'll both be visiting kreld-face then." Niddler crassly retorted with a glare of tense foliage-fire.

"He can't do this!" Ren exploded from the viewpoint, helplessly scouting the spectacle inside the spoiling slough. His heart beat fast in his chest. Eyes showed a clear torment, not nearly felt before by his torrential will.

Bloth chuckled smugly. "Is that what you think, monkeybird?" With disdain the wrathful Pirate Lord teased. He prowled to draw a still-attached cutlass from behind.

"Niddler! No, you don't have to! I can set you free, I'll just have to release Bloth to-" Tula, who had threshed away many of the assailants and now resided in the internal labyrinth that was closer to the washing depths, called out to Niddler in the epicenter of a bottomless pit. She distressed as she swam forward with the jewel to drive it in to the cheerless vacuum, she had been very close when she could not continue her sentence. She was marred with the worst bite upon her palm she could have encountered, it forced her to withdraw.

"No, Tula!" Niddler screeched as he drove her away. "You know I only stuck around for the ride and the food anyway." He directed at Ren, dauntless despite but distinctly broken up.

"I promise we'll go back for you Niddler...we have the Treasures-" Ren began to inflect to the beloved monkeybird, of course there would still be hope. The Dark Dweller did not completely destroy his captives, as father had said. Niddler nodded with an assured promise of revisit. Then, Bloth stirred in the water. His eyes became pinpoints.

Bloth's wicked laugh rebounded, in his hand he cleaved an imposing mincer focused on the chest of the red avian. "You miscalculated, Ren! Since I know you have ways of getting your fallen friends out of the dark water..." Bloth cleverly walloped. "This monkeybird's throat is mine to slay." His horrible threat projected for the last time as he raised neck-bending steel.

"So this is it. You won't win, Bloth. You never will." Niddler gallantly succumbed to his sacrifice. "Tula, I.." He inclined to his ebony-locked pal to express the final words he could not even finish. Bloth howled sickly as Ren saw the final vow carried out on the now-limp life, the first time the boy had witnessed such a tragedy so close.

"No!" Ren anguished like crazy, he flailed with a terrible woe against Ioz. The older helmsman witnessed the heartbreaking sight of Ren beating his fists through the air.

"We're not going to engage Bloth in dark water! He's gone!" Ioz laboriously outcried. He forcibly held back the young sailor. Ren thrashed and he needed to deliver a punch to lad's shoulder. He would have to keep Ren down through visibly watery eyes, the Quest needed to go on. Ren did not stop because of this, but because of the shout from Ioz at the pang from the injured side. "We have to destroy the dark water now, stop! If you care about Niddler at all, we need to continue! We need to finish the Quest!" Ioz yelled through a quivering purport.

"Niddler no!" Tula wailed into the breeze. She would have to swim quickly for respite to prevent being consumed by the hoard of mashing jaws, but her heart sunk and sobbed. By the time the aphotic silt had dispersed from the area, there was nothing she could have done in the cleansed water. Too late.

"I love you Niddler, friend." Ren splashed a drop from his cheek, he whispered the painful farewell in honor.

"Eight Bays of Mer! Ren, you need to act now!" Avagon accelerated to inform Ren of the pressing danger of the engulfed pirate. Beneath her and Zoolie was a tied-up Konk, who appeared very irritable.

"What do you want me to do...now?" Ren mournfully creaked his murmur on Avagon, she was bearing for him but he was begging for his job to be fulfilled.

"Your Father found this out, it's from the Chronicles of Octopon! The Surge is now part of many things like the Stecca-fog and the Blight on Andorus, we're positive it's worked a way into various species and peoples by now. Dividing the The Surge from the Dark Water is the only way to win this fight and that can only be done by combining the forces of the Spirit in all Thirteen Treasures with the natural power of Ecomancy. That will render the dark combination useless, but that will never be possible unless you drain the last fragment of the Treasure of Rule from him!" She distinctly jolted the Heir over the commotion seen in the nipping depth. "He still carries a darkened form within him!" Avagon thoroughly forewarned, running forward to where Ren overlooked the slipping Captain.

"But if it's already darkened...and split by Morpho..." The young prince perplexed as he ruefully bore into the ocean, only cutting away to answer the wise woman.

"I won't be destroyed Son of Primus, not even by the Greatest Threat to me!" The Dark Dweller boomed from the impeccable reaches of the uprising waves, in awe of the Margar spirit within a ghostly statue. The illusion of ecomancy's origin shaped to the girl of rose, the magnificent spite wiggled between Avagon and Ren to offer up her gift.

"It will purify within you, do not fear! The power draws to the source, as long as you have the Compass from the original River of Toishuok you'll be able to pull it back! Combine your energy with Tula and I will help you!" Avagon confirmed as she helped Tula across the breadth with a weight-bearing hand.

"I don't think I can do any more, Avagon, but I'll try!" Tula made a strong oath with her word, actively pushing herself to Ren's angle.

"How can I punish him when he doesn't feel bad at all? I want him to pay for what he's done so much but he doesn't feel any remorse!" Ren sadly ground against his own conflict, pendulating between an aggravated abandon.

"That's what Mantus was like, Ren. It's the dark water's hold, don't mind me but do you think we're out of it?" Zoolie agreed with a subdued empathy, glancing at the terrorizing disciple across from him.

"You just have to let him be eaten by the darkness, Ren. You must withdraw the Treasure from Bloth now or we are doomed! It has to be at the brink of the water or never!" Avagon stressed the final chance for the process, she joined with the pair in support.

"Maybe you don't feel anything for anyone but yourself, but I swear by my father's soul, Bloth, when we get out of this. I'll make sure you never have any power again! It won't be pleasant, either." Ren promised staunchly, such hardness was in his voice then that it was not recognizable. He and Tula united their talents. The Dark Dweller dwarfed for the time and gradually, the energy withdrawing in Bloth's hands began to pour back into the proper owner. It glittered as it returned to the alighted condition. Ren experienced all his vitality resuming a flawless state.

"That's what you think! I only serve...the Dark Dweller!" The jagged expulse dragged into a wrenching fizzle as the crew witnessed Bloth's final downfall, the peak of what remained of his ashen head was gone and sinking into the gulf below. He at last gave himself over to the dark water as the Dark Constrictus's shredding throat enjoyed a paunchy offering with voracious clamor.

"Something is wrong!" Avagon's shout ricocheted.

Morpho coiled throttling darkness around the youthful savior, choking his breath directly from the havocking core. His majestic body pulsed and sundered when the cloud squeezed into his throat. The mass of gray sludge blared within his screaming neck and a renewing revulsion, bulging underneath the veins. The good captain convulsed with toiling kicks at a tendril as it crept up his chest and pierced the breastplate, sparing him no agony. Ribbons of the abysmal underworld wound on skin and bone, rooted in a ray of red from cursing eyes. Out of the smothering graveyard on waves of Mer's ocean arose the towering demon Ren had transformed into, the very likeness of the Abomination's plague. Like Daven, his trident impaled the heaven-linked stars.

"Well Zoolie, the chips were down before...but I think we really are sunk now." Ioz coughed and nursed his damaged trunk, Zoolie awed in jitters as the black lightning rained on the unstoppable planking and crumbled entire walls of an unbreakable fortress like the sea-god, Daven.

Dark Ren's whole crown in the buried sun could encircle the rounded beam of Bloth's hull. The mantle of slime on his shoulder swashed below the deck to eat at the impenetrable skeleton of the monster vessel. The smashing trident rendered the Maelstrom to spare parts, disjointing solid ribs and spars only for a wash away in the monsoon of gloomy tide. The endangering doom the Prince of the Dark Water's blood-gaze centered on, bolted powerless tremor into a sea-sick pipsqueak. Dark Ren snatched Konk and rung him about, folding him among the nippy weather.

"Why Ren?!" Tula stood on the bridge as she fought to reach Ren one final time, but he paid her no mind. "Ioz, wait! Maybe if we throw the Amulet...it's cursed, and I sense a destruction plague around us!" Ioz immediately lassoed a hook and line onto the Wave, they would need to flee the board with no time to spare if they were to survive. The roughened seafarer tilted down the pulley, his knuckles clapped the bar to white when Tula latched to his limp ankles at the final instant.

"Destruction plague? No-bilge, that is Ren. Throwing this jewel away won't do anything now to solve our rotten luck. My old friend, Taneuka, and Kayraadin were sisters of the sea. Not genuinely, but they were as close as two sea-leeches on a barnacle-board. Kayraadin gave the two halves of the Amulet to Jazhea and Taneuka." Ioz persisted in clinging to the mystic charm.

"Kayraadin, that girl I saw in my dreams...with hair of rose. Who was she?" Tula questioned Ioz's finer judgment but she remembered always seeing a ghost inside her visions. Destroyed by dregs of black ocean was nothing of the fate she imagined Ren would become of without the apparition's inference for his youth. The block unsteadily snagged on the rescue cable and two pairs of arms were left hinging from the links at a screeching halt.

"She was...a special woman. While I was crewing for Bloth a second time Kayraadin had left Taneuka at eighteen-years on the sea-of-life to become a Maelstrom stowaway, and was bought as Mantus's pet. I was always her favorite cabin-boy to pick on when Mantus had told her to dish out some grueling order he wanted done, but I didn't know about her bilge-fortune. I hated her but I never talked to her like Zoolie did." Ioz stumbled with the voice of a hopeless wish. He clamped his busting arm down the bone-pier's moor and knew well and full he would not reach the bottom before the wind could even depart.

"I heard Mantus locked Kayraadin in the brig on the Maelstrom, but he let Mizar became lost in the sea for his flight with Saytasi and Phorlock to Kalinda so they could protect the Chronicles of Octopon. So was it Kayraadin who was at fault for what Mantus allowed to happen?" Tula respired as she straddled the water in her method of conducting a means by madness. Her knees released from Ioz's shoulders and flexed to a perch on the rickety binds.

"I never saw her cry." Ioz coolly curbed his patience with silence. Tula tactlessly looped above the scrunching metal coils, praying a rusty ring would not send them to Mer's central-core. "Like I've said, my fallout with Bloth wasn't over any Coral Reef or Captain Raymit. It wasn't over Kayraa or Mantus, any Treasure either. No one could tell you all the sailors and civilians slain by Zuuror Mantus of Qui-Qua, or Liege-Mizzen-Conquest, not over those souls taken. It was over himself and what I was going to stand for. Zoolie and I swam back to Octopon after the mutiny I started, it was the first and only on the Maelstrom. We went our separate ways and I saw Taneuka on her deck sometime again, I told her what had happened to me." Ioz panted heavily when he looked down below, bending to retain his weight-balance.

"And then?" Tula emerged upon the notch and with a riled outcry her scouring courage wavered over the gnashing spates as they swallowed more of the sky. Pink leggings sloped to the deadly ocean when she yanked on the swart sailor's abounding fists, Tula slid between a sea-circus trick and a grisly end beneath.

"...She broke my seafaring heart." Vaguely Ioz uttered his disguised trouble but Tula remained to echo with an understanding nod on his unsaid reason for secrecy. "I told her about what Bloth and Mantus had done and what I did, she was appalled I would willingly stay on board with someone who could do something as ugly as what Bloth allowed Mantus to do to Kayraa. Kuunda gave me all the chance to duck at port but in her eyes I had chosen to remain to claim revenge for my father Raymit, and I was no better than the creatures I fought. She ordered her men to throw me overboard near the coast of Kalinda, I went mercenary after that. I was bitter because of what she did, but back then I didn't understand she feared for my safety the whole time I was there. Taneuka gave me this when I sacrificed myself, once before I knew what being a pirate was. Because we had chance encountered Bloth when we were lost at sea and he demanded Taneuka throw him one of her able-bodied men to him or he would take Taneuka herself for his own crew...she told me Kayraa's Amulet of Devotion would help keep me safe on my voyage with Bloth, and that Kayraa had given her this half of the jewel as a girl and she wanted me to have it. Taneuka was the only woman who ever wasn't, and the only captain who ever was to me." Ioz held Tula as if he were a first-mate kneeling over his wife's everlasting cry.

"I'm positive the only way to save Ren is by throwing it out from us! Kayraadin's ghost can only save him now!" Tula roved her affliction to the blob which was the Evil King Ren crushing the Maelstrom.

"Between Ren and I you can't choose both our lives, Tula." For the paralyzing instant his pendant twirled on the golden strand Ioz resisted giving his soul to save anyone but the woman in his memories. The line floated into the skyfield and cracked like a whip on the ecomancer with her most tenacious shipmate, as they both hung on for sweet life.

"There is a Curse on the Amulet! Throw it!" Tula impelled her partner's arm to act but he clenched hard, those pleas whispered weakly.

"Fine, what now?!" Ioz impulsively ripped the Ruukaana Amulet from his neck and scattered it into the dark water, he demanded the final suggestion as it sunk with the demolished Maelstrom in the wretched tide.

"Now we-" Tula hauled her gasp. "Sink!" She screamed as the chain flayed and snapped, the enormous links disintegrated as they touched the depth's threshold like fallen blocks of tinder. The duo plummeted until a wide chunk of the bones snatched the remaining line and forged a divided pathway from the bridge of the Wave, Tula stood on the closer refuse.

"Tula, get lost! You have open-water, you mad woman!" Ioz rattled a scold out of clasped hands as his tread skid on the trim of a leviathan's femur.

"Ioz, you're not done navigating us out of danger, don't think that. In truth, I don't want to see you give up on me." Tula picked up her foot to scale along the submerged maw of skeletal decay to stretch for Ioz on the opposite island of wreckage, not abandoning his side.

"I don't know why I treated you like you were meaningless. Tula...you were someone I wished was there to prove your worth on the ocean with us...who knows what you would have done if I had told you it happened like this in my hay-day. I promise you if I live I will never question what you know in your heart is true. On Captain Raymit's sword and Soul I swear you are the best...jitatan woman, to rule the Twenty Seas and I will never try to deserve it more than you. You are Supreme Ecomancer Sugii's Daughter and you're destined for better than Maelstrom sea-scum, so live it." The somber pirate held his solitude with a sorry surrender to climb down into the crashing waves of sinkhole sludge, granting Tula more altitude and allowing her a safety leap. The ecomancer instead raced to swing the only cable over dark water to connect it on the opposite mound where Ioz awaited his doom.

"We were crew!" Tula vivaciously roped Ioz in his lunge and their hands met at last to swerve chaotically for the beached frigate.

"I am your crew, but so is Ren!" Ioz embraced the ride on the winding metal while a pang ripped from his throat, a pop in his torso wore his overwhelmed strength to the limit. Ioz and Tula had only backlashed for the ledge of destination when flashes of blinking white rocked them off a stable balance upon the chain. With Dark Ren's power the crewmates flailed through the sky and back-snapping lurches shattered the steel rope into the beyond.

"Konk think Bloth be better captain!" Konk bellowed as his chubby face rained out from the hurricane and squashed on the Wave's stern, ivory eyes of the piglet rolled to unconsciousness.

"Well, lad, you sure had gotten me going there for a while. See you when Mer is dead, Ren!" On the engulfed rubble the survivors clasped each other as they admired in horrified petrification the remnant of their friend, a macho buccaneer's lips shuddered to his undoing. Ioz and Tula cringed for their fate.

Like a shooting star the ocean became alive with a crackle of energy, a gust of colors and phantasms rested on the stage of the dark sea. With a ceasing hand-signal the divine goddess condensed her aura to a slow revolution. Like the Treasures of Rule inside the lighthouse of Octopon her silken essence encircled the cold current with her spirit.

"Supreme Ecomancer Sugii, Her Highness!" On all mounts of the Maelstrom debris civilians and warriors alike bowed down in reverence.

"I carry a drop of the River of Toishuok within myself, and this blessing from Kuunda bound to my Soul will be yours. Answer me, Ren!" Sugii cruised over the vile surf and confronted the deviation on the summit. In her shadow a sprightly wizard stalked, the hollow guardian aligned with his wife's back and crouched with his arms in the patterns of the night.

"Prince Ren, I will have you stop by the Magicks of Kauldron, Ecomancer of the Moons' Mirage, and my bride, Supreme Ecomancer Sugii of the Sun's Glory. Dark Water, you must kneel down to Ren, Son of King Primus, at my command." Kauldron with his enchanting verse rose the evil sea and spread each web of the whipping Curse, inside the plagued heart could be seen a gentle boy.

"Daughter, Tulina!" Sugii ignited from emerald eyes, to the beautiful curves of her nature-aligned physique. "I imbue this with you, use it well!" She transferred her motion to Tula. To the back of Kauldron a quartet of fastened braids tossed from their arrangement, mystic jewels on the clasp of wavy locks floated as she lit up a rainbow of the elements. "Your friend is not gone, because Tulina, Good never dies." Sugii certainly professed as a cascade of Merrian manna burst from intertwining portals, each hued pink and blue. She arranged with her husband, the warlock, in a symphony of guiding dew-drops like gloss from the raining sun. "Ren, return." The resurrecting spell did not slide from Supreme Sugii's gale with a fragment of failure or a single wrong turn of her world-staff, lightning fizzled and opened a dome of prismatic brilliance as she drew the eternal Treasure from her very core. The crystal hovered through the crest of Dark Ren, energizing a forcefield over the far reaches of his destiny. The Treasure dispersed and merged with his life. "This is Sugii. I have given my Soul once again, this time to sacrifice my Treasure fragment to this wise Prince. Beware, if he becomes corrupted once more by the Darkness, he will be perpetually submerged and there is nothing I or my Daughter, Tulina, may do but Mer will be lost..." Sugii and Kauldron egressed in flames, Ren spun and was captured by a drift. The cloud-hume Sugii left in her sublime dust happily exchanged the restored man on the deck of the Wave for a kindly pat on the fluffy pomp, and a hume-treat as a reward. Tula stared upon Sugii's Soul after she tended to the woozy captain, her senses swelled with a limitless invigoration as she watched her depart.

"Ey Konk, you know as well as I do the vodelinger who was responsible for solely blaming you for the loss of that phony Treasure ye commissioned to get for all that gold? Wanna take a peek at where he is now?" Zoolie delightfully appealed a second time to the ex-minion, pointing with a thumb to Disciple Mantus.

"Ok! Me follow Captain Ren now!" The swayed Konk gulped with trepidation.

"Great! Nice to see you're being reasonable old deckmate. Help us hoist those sails!" Zoolie issued the first order, lashing the runt loose. Tula briefly swung by to knock the dark disciple down.

The depredation of gook that surrounded the ship was unsatisfactorily silent after it swallowed Bloth. The disciples were staying at bay now, due to the three Treasures of Rule the team had used to jaunt them away. Stormy skies continued to brew. Quick yet insufficient repairs were made. Something was steeping in the puddle. The slaughterous brine boiled from the hem of the vessel that commenced to chop through to the lighthouse. The unnoticed figure started to emerge from it's depths.

Konk executed a rigorous turn toward shore, it had begun to feel like something was pulling the rudder. "Captain Ren! We stop!" The piglet yelled out from the wheel, eyes were casting worriment.

"What is it, Konk?" Ren wondered what the problem could be, he scanned around the tenebrosity and did not make note of anything unusual. "We'll search the ship to find out what's wrong." He commanded as he patrolled along the starboard, inspecting for any sign of trouble. Both Ioz and Tula with the remainder of Bloth's former league joined him in the search. Finally, someone probed out a disturbance in the water.

"Captain!" Came a voice of a pirate who pointed at a bubbling pool off the starboard-quarter. There was a white arm that was snagging the rudder.

Ren zoomed to the side of the man and his eyes grew immensely. "Chungo lungo. No!" The prince exclaimed with a biting recreancy. Ren sped to the side of the ship with the Sword and Treasures to chase off the invader.

"Careful Ren...remember what Sugii said!" Tula forewarned imminently.

"Go! Toward the lighthouse!" Ren steadfastly ordered, he hopped down closer as he heard the compliance of the company. "Argghhhhhhh!" He screamed from his strained maw, he felt his waist beginning to collapse, his breathing arrested. He whipped legs within a suspended motion, doubting anyone could hear him. All helpless Ren could do was gaze down at his stomach being sundered by the clutches of the new disciple. His vision blinked rapidly upon the shelf where he had temporarily stalled the jewels. He heaved and kicked at the destroying servant of his life's vulnerability, gasping for air.

"Go!" The foreign yell could be heard, but in vicinity. The slaves were again surfacing from the hatch below by staid activity on deck. Under Avagon's direction, weapons were taken and fired at Dark Disciple Bloth from the platform. The tight hand allot more freedom and Ren sealed a palm around his protection. Ren thrust the Sword of Primus at the killing extremist of the Captain, slowly driving the form away from the tail of the frigate. The Wave neared the harbor at last. Ren launched himself away, but he witnessed a greater danger arising.

The warfare continued on the beachline of the Crystal City. In an area not far away, black waves rolled in.

"By Kuunda, what on Mer is that! We have to go now!" Cried a young lady from the crux of the land. Two more women soon followed.

Dagrons planted on the bow of the crowding vessel, the void veered about the hull. The way the dark lashed up, it appeared to create a cylindrical encasement all around.

"Noy borga! This dark water is very unnatural! Ioz!" Running at the side of the other, a lass of deep complexion swerved through the crowd. She ceased in front of a flinty scoop of slime that had somehow made it on to the floor. "How is this possible?" She frighteningly screamed. The thing seemed to be an Octopus with gunk qualities. From the fantastic wall hopped down an emaciated ruffian. Strange entities were spurting from the crow's nest.

Ioz set his hard-luck gaze on the nuisance little-sister and the Mantus plague. When he looked above, his world completely toppled.

"Quick! We have to make it back to Octopon!" Ren scrambled to stand up and require desperate measures, the end of the stern tipped toward the patch of sea converged in murk. Dark Disciple Bloth was scaling up the brim. Under the tempestuous sky, gigantic wings began to conjure.

"Jenna! Ren is restored, get to dry land!" From Ren's side Tula called the name of the noblewoman as she clung onto a rope. She braced Ren, they both fumbled on to a nearby bastion.

"There is something I need to tell my son!" The red-tresses of the keeper spilled on a thud as Jenna sought Ren through the loud turbulence. Then she screamed, the floor felt as if it was being dragged from underneath. She and the fellow crew-kin believed they would fall to the end. The imbalance teetered to an even level as another reptile floated down from the enclosing shaft of grime.

"Go to shore! The disciples are there! Avagon, your fleet needs you!" Saytasi hastily notified as she sprung forward. Avagon rationally scooted between both assignments.

"Go ahead, I've got this one." Zoolie nodded her a word. He pushed a hanging bucket after the undead tactician and some other disciples in tow.

"Very well." Avagon dubiously granted Saytasi lead, the dagron departed from the bow. Black globs clunked from the tips of the sails.

"Worthless Ren! I was the only One born completely of the Dark Water! The Surge from Stalagor made me what I am! Everyone else was different from me, and I made them suffer for it as the late Avadasia before me." The cruel clamor amplified. Senses were hit with sharp pins by the laugh.

"No...!" Tula muttered in her sense irreversible, she hid.

Dark Bloth had completely surmounted to the rebounded deck, bringing his mass up to target Ren. "Of course, this pales comparably to the power and fortune being Mer's more dangerous Pirate Lord brings. I ended them because I never needed their cheap values like teamwork, if they were of any use they would still be alive. Now you are going to see the Abyss...by my sword." The laden trunk stalked forward with incalculable calm, wood creaked. The sliver was coated in onyx, dark water. The boom was hard and then the first clang of steel. The nobleman shrilled.

"Ren! Don't fall! By the Gods, I won't let you! Not now!" Tula squealed with dying vivacity, she inflicted jolts on the advancing barbarian. She wallowed from the fruit of her labor, reeling to the floor. Her eyes wobbled, and folded.

"Tula!" Ren despairingly wailed, seeing the brave companion ebb and slide along the plane. "That's it! This is the end! Tula and Niddler...you'll pay for what you did to both of them, and everyone you made to writhe! Now, Bloth. We're finishing this!" He rejuvenated his nerve, severing forward with another intense push. When he was blocked, he simmered with his defeat. He had reached the end of his potentiality, and his spirit. He witnessed only one opening, the demolisher boosted the slicer. It came down and incised into it's destination. Ren mirrored the offensive. Two cuts resulted.

"Tula! This can't be it! I'm so sorry..." The pirate in the due center of the sludge-sheltered warship observed the tragedy, shuddering under a taxed exhale. "Come on! Let's go! All of you! I'll send you all back to the blood of Fezwa's rift where you belong!" Ioz roared with a merciless hysteria, his throbbing cage only served to inspire his stamina in that moment. He boarded a halyard to the zenith of the mainstay with a shooter in arm and thrashed back the strap. Many fanatics and gelatinous blobs bounced, flown by dragon-bolts.

Ren's wound mended. The assassinating murk was no longer glued to the former Captain's weapon. The 12th Treasure lay on the opposite spread, it was wind-whipped into the barrier by nothing short of a natural-force's power. He kneel on the ground with one desisted knee as Disciple Bloth shrunk from the tormenting luminescence. With the Sword, he managed to impale a hit. He swept away again at the vulnerable shoulder, but the adversary then commenced to leap from the ship.

"Let's take her in, now!" Zoolie commanded from running the board to elevate the riggings. "You two, over here! Don't just be standing around!" He shouted to the girls by the sidelines who were guarding with the other two Treasures. Solia and Jenna raced forward to help the sheet unfold to the maximum. "Ey, Konk. Think you can take 'her home? If you can't, you can join them!" He gleefully gestured to the horde working the sails.

"Konk will do it!" Konk boastfully declared with the first fervent smile he beget.

"Will ye? Then she's yours!" The tavern-proprietor let out a dazzled word, he grinned gratefully. Zoolie jumped away from Konk to organize the toil of the crew and the rebels.

Ren watched the massive dragon comprised entirely of dark water encircling the prey beneath. The Wave cruised in the one unclouded rupture created by the Treasures of Rule. "Tula, it's my fault. My fault you..." Tears tore from the beatific prince's eyes over the paled woman lengthened across the doused stage, he softly whispered. "I failed father, I've become like Bloth." His speech mellowed, vision no longer definite. His fingers quietly smoothed the frame of the ecomancer's cheekbone. "After we've been through it all, I thought we would all make it to the end of this. You protected me with your life, but I..." He shivered after a fragmented break. The wind was cold in the way the sea often was upon submergence, but it had not felt any different at all. "There was no reason I attacked him, I just wanted him to know misery. I never believed I could want to cause it, but now I've done too much and hurt everyone. Without cause." He wept in secrecy at the narrow corner, until he at last ceased. Kerroptus had not paid him any heed, the bleak dribble from the encasing column continued to flow and exterminate as it lauded at an irrelevant blaze from the 12th Treasure laid on the timber span. He placed his lips on the stilted forehead and forced himself to rise. The handsome regal was set on a container comprised of the flesh of the most magnanimous of beasts, filled with an orange contaminant. From memory, he disregarded Ioz's previous comment about Mantus being aloft on nightmare juice. The water, or the nightmare venom, he dumped. Ren plowed for the leak on slippery feet, he bowed before this new shrine of Kuunda that was here to take him. Ioz pinged the scaly bucket from all grasp.

"Ren! If you try that again, I swear to Kuunda and my father's blood I will throw this to Bloth!" Ioz's rage slammed down along with himself from the mast over the course of a fractional instant, the fantastic Sword flung itself into the boards. "Bloth took the woman and monkeybird, but we're not done yet! I didn't follow this Quest for this far with the intention of seeing you dive into a net!" He tortuously yelled, stilling Ren with a squeeze on the wrist. He demanded the despondent teen look him square in his own densely blinking eyes. "I would have died a long jitatan time ago. Do you know why I'm still here? I faced the toughest and most brutal perils the twenty seas has to offer, for the sake of my mates. They did the same for me. Even the bravest women that I've known from my pirating days have not stood up to the things Tula has. You're chewing eel-kelp if you think I'm going to let you sink, brother." Ioz wildly afflicted, he squinted his gaze at the settling lad. With a durable arm he sheltered the boy, sweeping his eyes away until he cared no longer.

"Ren, there you are!" The outcry came from nearby Jazhea, she joyfully hugged her younger counterpart. "Uhh..." She began to stir when she witnessed Tula stagnant on the floor.

"Chunga lunga! Big brother! Thank Kuunda you're ok! I think the dark water is off the path, finally!" Solia belted forward with gasping wind, ensnaring Ioz by the arm. She stood back when glancing at Ren and the nearby enchantress.

"Ioz, is everything in shape? We'll be at port in-by my beard." Zoolie stopped when he saw the crowd gathered.

"Take her below, she deserves a better rest than up here." Ioz dutifully commended, turning away from focus. He then revealed his facade. Zoolie only nodded affirmatively, he carried the ecomancer away.

Solia garrisoned at the shoulder of Ren. "I suppose this is my fault." The port-thief wondered, but she did not go on about it. "It's not easy being King, is it?" She understood now. Ren occupied a protective arm at her waist. "It's not easy being a princess...or a wharf-rat." Solia defined furthermore. Zoolie returned.

"As I was saying, we'll be there in less than a leap of a sea-pooch. Provided Konk is keeping us on course." The barkeeper stated from clunking up the stairs. He neighbored to the nested circlet in the middle of the vehicle.

"Good, Zoolie. I can't take any more scenery of this bilge variety." Ioz listlessly droned, quietude continued. The dual sisters paid respect to the remaining crew, observing in a solemn form. "To the end of our Quest!" The abrupt profession called all to attention.

"To the end of our Quest, mate." Zoolie was the first to join in, tapping a rounded hand over Ioz's. The girls peered at each other, offering support. Joiquiva leaned parallel on Ren's shoulder and awaited with a contact of sight.

"To the end of Our Quest." Ren shuddered his worn lids and enjoined his vow. He placed his hand with the other two men, designating a triad.

"For friendship between every man and every woman. We'll fight for Captain Ren, until are days are done. Or let Kuunda strike us dead." Ioz made a final bold sentiment. Jenna and Solia nodded and also bowed heads. The Wave flew forward on nimble sails to shore, jolly-roger hoisted high and billowing in the steam.

"Captain Ren is greatest!" The group could hearken upon a grand bellow. "There be problem." The perky pitch became tentative. Konk pointed above at a massive bulk eclipsing all luminance. Near to the vessel stretched a monolithic dragon filling out any trace of where the sun should be.

"Welcome back, Lord Bloth." Mounted on the skull of the all-consuming monster, Disciple Mantus transmitted a cordial invite to his fellow rider. Holding the bridle of the abysmal demon, he arched the beak to the floating threshold of light and corruption.

"At long last, the Treasures of this World will be ours. The Dark Dweller will be pleased." Bloth of the Dark Water likened to a chuckle, laying a ponderous claw under a bearded chin.

"Aren't you going to welcome me back, Son of Primus? For when the Dark Dweller takes the hearts of all men on Mer, the Treasures of Rule will exist no longer because their magic will fade with every accumulated spirit feeding them Healing energy! The Dark Dweller's most devoted disciples are here to bring death and disaster to this unwelcome pureness of the oceans. With the Dark Water flowing in the abysmal veins we will reign until the mountains become dust, and the Wave of darkness will destroy all...like the lives of your useless friends! Because you will have the honor of personally swallowing the unworthy as Master's slave of slaughter, bow before us and surrender to your fate beneath your new Master, Son of Primus! The Dark Dweller!" Subhumans from all foots revered the word of the highest follower of them all, Morpho, the Wrath of the Final Takeover. Volcanic tar floated from the sticky depths of the planet's core when Dark Mantus and Bloth knelt to make way for Morpho and the other disciples of the underworld.

The Dragon flapped unwieldy wings that fluctuated pollution. "This world is ours for the taking! Only the inhabitants of our Master will have life here!" Kerroptus yielded with a harrowing roar.

"Give up, Son of Primus! Before I assure your ultimate annihilation." The destructive sound of the Dark Dweller ripped from the bed of the swamping black. The heart of abomination arose with flaring pools of blood.

"Thank you, Konk." Ioz's gratitude broke the interval of calm. "We appreciate your steering us here." He genially conveyed.

"You welcome!" Konk frisked at someone congratulating him.

On the closing brim, warfare prolonged into oblivion. The promise of sorrow loomed on the horizon.

"Pull back! We can't win, this is lunacy!" Queen Malu lashed back from a Tarnda, abhorred at the jets of killing rot befalling her troops. "Captain Norga!" She outcried once more.

"Queen! They have us surrounded!" Captain Norga winced from an attempt at retreat. Fanatics continued pour forward, armed with directed filth-guns.

"Hey you! Yeah, that's right! You!" The erratic hoot called at a ragged ball of threads scuttling up the waterside.

"Must...make it back! I need to get back...to Miragon! Or somewhere!" The figure in shredded apparel coughed the bank water in heaves. "Huh?" He heeded his scrutiny to a rustling ripple of feathers overlooking him.

"You won't find anything worth your time on Miragon, pup!" The flitting voice burbled. "But I know what you will find here!" Roulette cheerfully jested, a loose Tarnda scampered after a new form of prey. "You happen to be in luck, Scoop here is in mating season and I think he'd love to be the proud parent of a diverse species!" Roulette chortled as he plopped upon the shell of the prodigious crustacean.

"Aaaaahhhhhhhhhh! Noooooo!" Slaggon screamed and departed on fiery feet at one glimpse at the creature. Roulette giggled hysterically.

"Avagon! We need to retreat or we'll be done for! There may not be a place to go, but Ren will be here soon. When he does, we will need to strike from elsewhere." Teron forebode on the fragmenting shore.

"I don't have time for this! Did you know anything about the Treasures of Rule or not?!" Somewhere along the coastline, a slender pilot interrogated a one-armed refugee.

"I don't know anything! You and your people should give your sputtering draja-filth a rest! I didn't know it was a fake when Bloth offered his scuddy amoeba-heads 15000 poogats for it, I would have never let it touch my deck! That Grutlamiran dock-rat, Konk, told your Guuda-Mizzen-Reed the local rumors about me because he was tired of swabbing timber-dredge as a midshipman! I could have murdered Konk if he hadn't made me meet a landshark on the Biperian coast that took my swordsman's arm, and I could have taken down His Majesty Shardfish of the North Pole back in the day...long before he started bartering dagrons! I found that treasure on Kalinda but I never said it was any raffendian Treasure of Rule, the only valuable thing I got out of that quest was an ancient scroll and I don't know what Konk did with it! My first-mate Scorrion passed it to me before he passed it to Konk and Mantus, because he listened to too many pirate's tales from barnacle-blasted Janda-town! I don't even care, it's not twelve years ago! I just want my jitatan boat back so I can be a jitatan pirate again!" The ranting flake bayed with a steaming temper, flailing arms and brewing clicks. The woman he exchanged conversation with was not the least bit impressed or pleased.

"You rudderless gilda-waste! I vow to Kuunda, and the Protectors of the North, if you say Guuda to characterize my rival's blood, me, or any soul from hom-" With sailing mane, the cloaked matron leapt toward him in a blaze of outrage. She scrunched elongated fists around the arms of opposing temperatures.

"Get another schoonie, you crazy sea-gypsy! Ahahaaaa! Whooohooo! Get over 'her chump, she has a new captain now. Seriously. Heeeheheeee!" Roulette playfully suggested from driving his new friend around every corner, Slaggon continued to cry for mercy. Worshipers of the gloom began to annex on their chase.

"The Crown Prince of Qui-Qua jumped the raft a long time ago!" The uni-paw snickered as he noted upon the bombastic spectacle of an inhuman Mantus pulling the horrible monstrosity. With a snap of metal, he smacked himself free from the aggressor. "Ren and Ioz are on that ship and I hope Guuda-Face kills-" He began to revile with a hatefully prickling stab, until his equine cheek flooded from a sting. Saytasi slapped him.

"Like I was saying, Monster bait. When New Qui-Qua shines with the glory and honor of her Empress, I'll make sure everyone knows exactly how pathetic and disgraceful the..." Saytasi paused, emphasizing her meaning. "Laughingstock of the Twenty Sea, truly is. When we get out of this, you'll tell me what you know about that ancient scroll of King Primus." She wittingly heckled the mutilated scamp with a condescending gesture, she threw the silver weakling over the brunt of her dagron and punched into the aerial spectrum. "Please let Ren pull through this..." To herself, she whispered a prayer.

The whole crew of the estranged ship paddled forward with the lighthouse in view. The titan obstructed all escape, save for the wind. The essence of discouragement would have shattered all around, were it not for the bravery of the withstanding heroes.

"We have to escape, now! There's a dagron here? We'll use it to fly to shore." Ioz authorized from racing about the slowly wanning woodplane, his breath toiled under an aching swell. With bow and metal, he dashed at the semisentient mollusk-hybrids. Bolts and clanks flew, the Kerroptus prevailed in spitting more of the slop-piles. Some resembled sea mammals, others were lumps of pure rubbish. With every fallen chunk, the deck edged closer to the darkwater-line. "Jitatan mutant-kreld! What good are Treasures if the jitatan Surge is mixed in?!" He expressed frustration, kicking a mass overboard.

"How will we take all the other people with us to shore? We can't just evacuate and leave them here." Ren called down from atop the crow's nest. With a Crown of gold, he forced courage into his heart as he fended the whipping of the wicked mire from the the flag and all below. He found the strength to continue on, he bore upon the races below him. His own caretaker and Solia were joining in the battle and striving along with every man and woman aboard.

"If we don't move soon, Bloth and the Dark Water are going to sink us into oblivion with this plague from a leviathan's cesspool!" Ioz pained with genuine trepidation, he spared his way from tripping over a clump of solid abyss. It felt more like a rock against his toe. "We can't go for much longer when we're being overwhelmed like this!" He exuded with a timorous inadequacy, the tide persisted with a rush and shake. Soulless Bloth and Mantus duly chuckled and howled.

"He's right. We better rethink before we abandon ship, we can't get to the shoreline anyway. With this many people, forget it." Zoolie pointed out to the blocked harbor. With a sword, he flung more spots of decay from the air to prevent them from touching the floor. The dense slurry was plunging into the enduring stew, some even going as far as the crystal water from the seaboard. Jenna and Solia tackled the invading clots with loose planks, batting the hardened sludge away. For every rotting stone plucked from the brim, at least three more landed upon the barge. The gulf had risen to only a hand's length from the lowest curve of the hull.

"It's ludicrous to think we can win!" Ioz bit with a chilling quaver. He lobbed an urchin from his own person.

"Prepare to join the ranks of cold extinction!" Kerroptus trumpeted with a blast akin to an avalanche. The barrage pitilessly rained down, averting no part of the soaking vessel.

"They're going to drown!" Dark Mantus scathed with a vicious jeer.

"It's only appropriate the Captain go down with the ship. Right, Ren?" The half-man Bloth ridiculed from overhead.

"Of course it is, and I will, Bloth." Ren absolutely assured. His eyes were determined like inferno-pearls as the deck tremored. Frigid appendages of distorted invertebrates descended and tipped the Wave closer to her doom. Ren scaled down the net at the wails from the dependable crowd, he stayed close to the ultimate resistance as the gush was about to break the withholding margin. He scanned eyes on the entombing sea. At the very least, they would go down in the strip of purity, before they would reach the throttling slime that trickled from the wound in the Crust. The gook had been building to the sidelines where it was thrown or displaced, forming a small reef of waste in the surf. "Ioz! Do you see what I see?" He hastily approached the conducting force, who was tearing ruin from the starboard.

Ioz ceased on a blot, and looked. "Yes, Ren. By the two moons, I do see!" The inflection of the swarthy pirate instantly curled.

"How have we always defeated him before?" The sly prince gleamed. Ioz mouthed a return signal.

"Let's go! Everyone! We're moving this seaquake like a thundering monsoon!" Ioz galloped to the wheel, spinning about like a reckless cyclone from Biperia. Confusion arose on the platform, cerulean begin to leak onto the maindeck. Tremendous screaming soon entailed. "Ren, brother, I've followed you this far. I'm not turning back now, but by the Soul of Mer, may you succeed this time." His silent wish trembled.

"Let's see if you can make us eat the ocean, Bloth! Mantus! Kerroptus and Dark Dweller! You won't catch us even if we sink with the Treasures, naja-dogs!" Ren stood upon the bow and vivaciously tormented the subduing forces of Darkness. The grin almost touched his stretching cheeks.

"Trim those sails! If you fellows and ladies ever wanna see the Merrian Sun again, I want every piece-a-scrap that's not kissing a rope or cloth thrown! Think of it like, a contest!" Zoolie promptly challenged everyone from the extended crew. On his own, he hefted a crate and bunged it at a swooping glob of slum. Hesitant chatters rebounded but then sprouted into a startling roar. After the second toss, a sea of people both regal and paltry hoisted bottles and barrels. Boxes and bastions. Soon, the entire fightership was alive like a galley-gala.

"Those fools. They think they can save their miserable lives by tossing their stock! They have no comprehension of what the Dark Dweller can do! I will swallow those Treasures along with Ren!" The Dark Dweller distracted himself with observing the rally of passengers shooting at the flying grime.

"They're spinning in a circle, they'll wear themselves away before they come close to grazing land! Destroy them, Kerroptus!" Disciple Bloth relished as he barked his demands, convinced of victory. More murky blotches screeched in the wind, targeting the spinning frigate.

"Bloth." Fanatical Mantus vied for attention.

"I told you I'm his squire! Who do you think?!" The affronted woman rashly showed her furor as a portion of her feminine grace was contrasted by her serviceman's uniform.

"She wants to be more valuable than what she is. That's no squire, that's an Emperor's daughter, Saytasi!" Atop the raving slush Mantus laughed fitly. The mention of the knight, Sir Phorlock, and the petty follower excited his reveling pride.

"Really? Princess Snore-star?!" The sound of a dual-boned mercenary cracking up tantalized Saytasi's impatient whims. "Fight of the twenty seas between Ioz, Ship-Snatcher and Mantus, useless Son of Emperor Phorlock! No matter who wins, they're both worthless like you and the rest of Qui-Qua's Royal Family! As if they'd let you be Queen, I can't believe you're his sister. You're more of a smool-brain than he is and he served the man who pilfered his country, for twenty years!" The guest on the tail of the lizard heckled as the driver withheld her clenching rage.

Saytasi boiled with slew, reddened from shame by her ungrateful kin. His intention was to humiliate her, and it worked. "I'll make sure you'll have lost as many limbs as a dartha-chomped water-spider!" The last of Qui-Qua's leading-ladies snapped at the spiky hooligan from the Southernmost Pole of Mer.

"I'm shaking, wench! You don't have any power!" The Valjen-born snorted crassly, not fearing any more than a slap on the cheek.

"Oh I don't, but a certain ghostly knight does." The middle-aged lass pointed to a spirit of an ancient King, alerting at an illusion amongst the dark water. The enemy-islander gulped at the coming consequences of messing with a daddy's girl as he believed her warning, but solaced when it became definite that Sir Phorlock was not present at all.

"Well guess what, Princess Snorestar, your Beard-Looper brother is still gonna die!" Joat openly snickered at the scene playing out.

"Aaiyah! What did I tell you about using slang, Naja-muzzle?!" The obsidian topknot of the pilot disarranged as she furiously shrieked with a lightening kick to her company's gut. "Disrespect my father and brother again and I'll show you real pain!" She immediately threatened, piercing steely pupils of ice at the foul-limbed who was now hanging from the dagron. He thankfully stopped. I Now Know Why You Named Me Father, Saqtie-Star Of Qui-Qua Is A Pretty Flower On Our Island That Puts You To Sleep, But Trample In The Grove Where They Grow And You're Sure To Meet A Quick Death. Saytasi reflected.

"Waste that scum all you wish, syska, the lesser of us will bow down before the Dark Dweller." Dark Mantus snarled with a dubious maw, calloused fingers coiled on the dragon of the end.

"Mantus, I loved you before you joined Bloth and before you were taken by the Dark Dweller, and I still do." Saytasi loyally vowed on her torn family. Her heart was not lost this day, or any.

"Heart-warming! Pull me up!" The unwittingly hitchhiker wailed.

"If I have to listen to another word from you about Ioz or the Wraith, I'm throwing you into the dark water right now. Those carvings are sacred! They're no good to you. Aksort trees grow on our island alone! For our people, I should kick you off right now but for the sake of Ren, I won't. I don't like you, and you don't like me, but today we are best friends! You're going to be good whether you want to or not, or I will throw your lewd Valjen-hide to the Dark Dweller. Understood?!" Above an unmistakable vantage, the belligerent contention of a mature lady snapped. The second fixture on the beast dipped a head of compliance and was returned to his station. "By Toishuok, am I not used to conducting myself in such a manner. Go!" Saytasi wiped sweat from her head, and soon followed up her arrangement with a sassy command. The dagron vaulted down at a breakneck speed until it crossed the state of convergence. The glinting hook clipped and yanked to the utmost boom.

"Chunga lungo, is that what I think it is?" Ioz marveled at the distinguishing light of an alloy-spliced humanoid dangling off dagron-back by two shiny legs.

"Think so, friend." Zoolie briefly flashed from his mobility to grant the rugged pirate an opinion. "Let's keep it coming! Don't let your seasick bellies stop ya! Whoever throws the most earns themselves a fancy payoff and grog on the house for a year!" He sportively rooted the multitude to inducing victory.

"I'm going to help!" Jenna excitedly hustled to spring upon the stagnant dagron and jostled into the sky. "Let's go, Beesall! Now that we don't have to worry about nasty-old Strand anymore!" She sanguinely insisted as she affixed to the opposite end after.

"Why won't they stop?! They can't escape from Kerroptus!" The barricading monster loathed, spewing more blasts. The floating vessel continued to encircle, but then it changed direction. The Wave instead shot fully for the hovering demon.

"They should be sinking soon! Why are they coming toward us?! Stay the course! Keep firing! Take them down and send them to the Black Abyss! Feed them to our Master!" Abomination Bloth roared with a reprobate loathing, swiping a fist in the wind. The muck was pilling on the continental shelf, creating connecting points between isles of barren doldrums.

"Lord Bloth." Disciple Mantus called once more.

"Yes Mantus?!" The undead warlord stunted.

"You are an imbecile!" With flying feet on the cranium of the humongous dragon the onyx-eyed driver raved. Mantus grasped the reigns, taking matters into his own hands.

"We're in this for the end this time, Ren. Whatever this Quest brings, destiny is ours and I'm not letting you fall." Ioz staidly witnessed from creaking the spindles of the helm for the angst over the sea. The cruiser chugged easier with the support of the dagron duo. Under the sway, he perceived a jingling noise behind him. "Solia." He focused a menial glance on the active woman, pondering her position. "Where are you going?" He interrogated his limping sister, who was bounding for the hold.

"Noy borga! My gold! How could I be so clumsy...I dropped some coins below deck, I'll be right back!" Solia nonchalantly chirped.

"Are you a gaada-fool, sister?! It's a few coins! Now's not the time for thi-" Ioz circumspectly hollered after her, cut short. He spun a gape at where the excitable girl had dispersed. His nerves became like jitters. His adrenaline rush had totally subsided in the speck of time he believed his bones would become as no more than shipwreckage from days past. It immediately returned. "Solia!" He shouted once more. "Ren! Zoolie! Konk!" He dangerously called for the knowledgeable. His receding hands perspired on the wheel, despite being ice.

"Aye, Ioz? Konk is helping me with the jib! We're in deeper kelp, by the way! Middeck is starting to fill, it's taking us all our hands just to keep the leaks from glugging her away! You know if any more of your lizard-lubbing chums can come up here? Kuunda bless their scud-skipping hearts, Jazhea and her helper can't keep us flying to Moonslake come." Zoolie remitted unfortunate news.

"Scot pango!" Ioz beat his fist from his placement, cursing of a vulnerability. "Ren!" He yelled. "Ren!" He outcried.

"Let's go, Bloth! You can't catch us, you Octarian darva-wor-huh?" Ren's ferocious carriage sweetened. He negotiated an arch of his eyes. He leapt over a puddle and hammered with unstoppable heels for a barrel-eyed colleague.

In the pacific compartment, stray articles were slung. Ropes and swashes of cloth were laid over berths of flat hardwood. The visitor groped through the storage-shaft for anything that sounded or felt like a precious currency.

"I know I have to get back, but I saved up so much. Solia, you're a jitatan dock-brain." The immature Tayhoj-native scorned her impetuousness, drips splatted in a slow trickle from the exterior platform. "I'll just find my gold and get out of here." She whispered in the dank cavern of panel, clawing on four limbs. Imagining she experienced a jolt, she jerked down to a recoiling posture by reflex and relaxed soon after. She hustled to her side and restored her focus on the open hatch, which was the singular source of outside glare. She shrieked mildly when she discovered she had tread upon a thick-rimmed shackle on the creaky boards and promptly scattered away. When she did, she discovered that she had ripped away a makeshift cloaking. Solia bore eyes at the pale ecomancer on the bunk as she pulled away the sheet from her hand. "Tula." She engrossed herself with the silenced pink-clad, sitting with palms on knees. "You made me into a fool, so why do I feel so much respect for you? Was it because you saved me and brother? Or do you love him in another way?" Her lip trembled, speaking to a void.

"Solia!" The femme in the crib perked ears at the unhesitating summon. Solia listened to Ren thundering down the stairs, and demurely tried to barrel for him. Then, a smiting boom returned instead.

"Ren, get up here, now!" Another faint but familiar scream could be subsequently hearkened.

"I haven't-" Only two words slipped from Ren.

"Aaaarrrgggghhhhhhhh!" The motion-ending howl was listened to from everywhere.

Topside, all structures collapsed. Two beasts could play medium to the devastation. The Wave was overturned.

The tidal shock crushed at another curb from Kerroptus and the Disciple Mantus directing the dive. Ren hung from a distended stake of the exiting frame. "Everyone!" Ren surmounted an alarm to attention over the havoc, with the steadfast audience from every surviving individual. "Abandon ship!" He recited dreaded words, with a plagued arm he signaled to a bridge of fossilized diabolism. "Ioz, take the Treasures and go! I'm not joining you until I find Solia!" He bid with an implacable conviction. With every atom he tried to dive for the ajar chamber, the fissure was like a tomb. Others had already commenced to flurry over the black strip of aquatic refuse at the assistance of Zoolie and the dagron-riders. Ren found himself again strapped back.

"No, I'm going! She's my sister!" Ioz hollered with a splintering pitch. "We're running out of time! Let me go! Ay chungo to the Rift of Quietus, that smarts!" He screamed with an ignited motivation, but he soon gave out with an exceptional burn lacerating up his ill-side.

"It has to be me. You can't carry her with that. Swimming like you are now won't happen, and not with another person." Ren prudently brought to quarrel the twisting split on the older pioneer's torso.

"Please, Ren. I can't handle seeing it again. We can't let them win now." Ioz's rent tone was almost invisible. His facade exclusively disappeared, he wouldn't let go of the younger sailor's arm. The prince grievously accepted. Two more passengers, the last ones to flee, supported each other on the immeasurable run to Octopon.

"No!" The hole-eyed Mantus stewed detested lips of his failure. He clenched a quadruplet fist and wrung his bridle for the fleeing civilians and The One.

"They'll never get past our Master's squadrons." With crossed arms Disciple Bloth remarked.

Ren and Ioz tailed the herd across the bits of severed sea-mass, the Surge-infested goop provided enough of a byway to the waterfront. Soon, it was known the despicable minions were attacking the surrounding area and all who were in it. The heroes quickly cut through the flood of activity. Avagon's crewmen were desperately trying to maintain control in the aftermath. "Heave!" Avagon ordered, she proceeded to prong a sword to another trapped ship that was being partially drenched with dark believers and the ignominious slime. Many dagron warriors and monkeybirds were laboring to pull the ferry to safety.

"Should we join her?" Ren precariously wondered. Ioz wearisomely assented.

Within the crumbling hull of the Wave, a youthful woman lay motionless.

Solia pushed herself up from the now flooding cavity. Tula's racked frame was jostled next to her own, Solia quelled a wound from her own temple. "Well, friend." Solia breathed. "I didn't always think highly of you, but I guess we'll meet our ends together, huh?" She timorously shivered, whispering to her only companion in the bilge-flowing crib. She would soon accept her end. "Ay jitata!" She procured a peculiar noise squeaking from behind her, a flicking surface where water was spurting into the plank dungeon. "Well, I only have one try." Solia optimistically professed, she steadied her mind and pounded an iron boot into the loose scruff of the enclosure. She created a passageway. "I didn't call you my friend before, but I know both Ren and brother would kill me if I let this kreld-market be your grave." She faintly smiled, speaking solo as she carted Tula's loose form. She remounted the boards in the tomb and squeezed her silhouette and that of the comrade through the narrow window of debris. She swam in tender sea to the skyline and shuddered when she witnessed dark water closing up the outlet. She heaved herself and Tula onto a bed of purged ocean-silt. Tacitly, she scurried the road to the Octopian coastline.

Near to the royal lighthouse, the crazed fighters teamed up in an explosion of allied efforts. Every available schooner and warship from Avagon's fleet debarked on the sand. Uncertain conflict between forces of restoration and elimination continued to blaze.

"Jenna!" Ren shouted for a missing party. "Where's Jenna?!" Ren unhinged as he watched around for any sign of his godparent. His eyes did not manage to find the lighthousekeeper. They instead shot on Morpho's shape, leader of the dark disciples, who was attempting to take Avagon by a tentacle. "Avagon!" Ren troubled aloud, he sprinted to the aid of the white-haired affiliate who brandished weapon.

"The Sword Of Primus?! No this can't be!" Morpho squalled with agony, his melanoid dots were like hollows in a dome. The sinful creature backed away, releasing Avagon but far from dead.

"Ren! The communicator around his neck! Strike at the communicator!" Ren wrest a call from over the rocky shores, adjusting on a goldenrod-headed master of Ecomancy.

"Teron?" Ren flung back answer in the direction of the elder. Teron nodded. In a split respite, he lunged at Morpho with the all-powerful weapon in hand and stabbed for the heart, where the communicator hung. Ren awed at the sheer potential of the blade in it's entire usage. The Sword of Primus contained sufficient energy, it destroyed the receptacle before even making contact. Morpho screeched with a fizz of turmoil, melting into violet gravel of decay.

"By the eight wonders of Mer!-" Avagon started to enunciate to Ren, eyes dagron-sized. She was abruptly interrupted however, as a speedy Ioz and Solia rushed in. The two humans carried her away from a wave of black pestilence that was about to touch down. Ren indomitably impaled the Sword through the incoming surf, it perfectly vanished into the purple mist.

"That was a close one, right Ren?" Ioz panted alongside, out of air from his exertion of rescuing the senior skipper. He tore away his gander from Avagon under sweat-sodden lids. "By the enchanted sea gods of Mer!" Ioz almost stumbled over when he welcomed the lost relative facing him.

"Sorry I'm late, big brother." Solia brilliantly gleamed, placing a standoffish smirk.

"I'm so-" Ioz began to stutter.

"Don't say it." Solia pushed in the way. Her gaze flew to a nearby shape, pivoting away from the lionhearted pirate. She seemed to consider a leap but she yelped on her leg.

"Solia! You're alright!" Ren cantered forward and almost laughed when he hugged the girl. Ioz had settled significantly.

"Ren!" Another person began to call. Upon closer vantage, he revealed himself to be Teron. "Where is Tula?" Teron interrogated with an imperiled skip in tone. The cluster of three instantly doused with a harrowing aura.

"Tula is..." Ren motioned the first phrase. "Taken by the sea." He imparted after a recognizable delay. "She gave too much to stop Bloth when we were, when I was, fighting him." The earnest prince doled. Ren blinked discs of mourning, not making eye contact above.

"That's impossible!" Teron consciously dismissed.

"Ren is right, but she didn't go down on the ship. I brought her here." Solia enjoined, much to the stagger of those around her. "What? I thought she deserved a better spot to rest...I messed up again, didn't I?" She skillfully offered, certain of error.

"We can't finish the Quest without her, bring her to me. Be quick." Teron did not waste time with words.

"But why, Teron? I don't understand, she used her ecomancy to save me and then-" With a downcast poise Ren hesitated.

"An ecomancer will never die from her own expenditure, only imbrue herself." Teron calmly explained, meeting with both excited and puzzled eyes. "As I was saying, bring her here. When Tula has done what you have described, her body temperature will be ecomantically lowered until she reaches the brink of death." Teron mindfully compelled. Solia hurried to point where she had laid the crewmate. Ren and Ioz exchanged glances, then nods. The duo raced away.

"Teron, what do you mean by we can't finish the Quest without her?" Solia wondered while awaiting the heroes' return.

"Then you have not yet been informed of the dual energies that protect this world, but you will know soon." Teron tranquilly informed his curious guest. Solia anxiously lingered.

"Oh chunga!" Solia pierced the oxygen with a shrill, disturbed from her posture.

"Ren and Ioz need to hurry!" Teron picked up the pace, he hastened to meet the pair of ventures halfway. Ioz and Ren struggled with Tula's shell, at last resting her down before the expediting Teron. "She should not have been going to extremes in the way that she was, but it this case, it was necessary. I need to give her a boost. Ren and Ioz, I expect you to stay on the defensive." He implored from the fellows. The pair resumed a position, snug and ready to triumph. "Even with the great abilities you have learned from your dearest family, you are still not ready, Child of Andorus. This time, you will have many on your side." Teron uttered softly as he lent his prowess to the developing nature-charmer. Sparks of strength rippled.

The troop of Treasure-seekers drew their heads toward the shores and saw a terror wave foaming from the sea, riding in from atop were Kerroptus and the Dark Disciples Bloth and Mantus. Behind the frontmen were multitudes of other fanatics who had become one with the dark water. The fiends mounted on the land, lead by the two former pirates who had become the Dark Dweller's servants. In perturbed distress, Ren spotted Jenna not far from the lighthouse. Right before the attending current of disciples.

"Jenna!" Ren screamed chaotically, he flew with all the trajectory he could behind his mighty feet. His closest friends were following him, along with Avagon and the entire fleet of her warriors of Mer. Monkeybirds bravely dove down at the wicked die-hards, dagrons circled. Warriors charged, bearing swords and other weapons. Many war-cries were heard as mere peasants fought courageously against the crest of apocalypse. Tendrils lashed out to restrain victims. Lifelines of sooty liquid were absorbed by the zealots through streams as the maniacs arranged in a cultist ring. Dark Mantus and Bloth had reached Jenna. Ren felt an acceleration course through him as he hightailed as fast as he ever did run. Dark water was creeping up her gown.

"I have your dearest remaining family, Son of Primus! The Dark Dweller will be victorious!" The voice of Dark Disciple Bloth filled the inked skies and air, behind him drew the most evil and feared face on all of Mer. The crimson glow of pure curse nearly choked all spirit in a giant influx. The strands from the hoop of doom twisted into a infernal tube, attaching to the behemoth leech of every known destruction.

"Hand over the Treasures!" The Dark Dweller reared up in an insistent appeal, gaining power from the absorption. The excruciating fluid squelched the caged caretaker's waist. The undead ex-captain confined Jenna's only passage.

"I was who your father trusted the most, I knew about Avadasia's dabbling with summoning the Dark Dweller from all corners of Mer to put an end to the Chronicles of Octopon which could enchant the Treasures to restore life lost to the world. You may not recognize me because Avadasia, the Valjen Queen, put a mask-spell on my body after she attacked the King's Palace the day your family was taken from Octopon! I ran to defend you after I cast Bloth back into Octopon's sea. King Primus always addressed me as his Sparkling Evelyn, which was why I knew your father's signature on the letter to the Moonsail-festival was false. I'm sorry Ren, my son! I didn't tell you the rest! Everything about your family, I was told not to!" Jenna exhaustively confessed from her binds. Ren waddled back with mercurial lids of beryl.

"By the slaughter of Guuda-bay under skies of the South! Dark Dweller, you will suffer for how you've changed Niok! And shed Yahil's blood! Qui-Qua's population dispersed because of it's absence of a true ruler that resulted from your contamination of the life of this world, and you will pay for that!" Saytasi let fly a bloodlusting war-cry at the mass of depravity, rows of fringing Valjen pirate-mercenaries behind her. Wings of scales bludgeoned forward with a rocketing thunder. Saytasi wielded her cutter against oblivion, but with a heartsore cringe, she watched as the icky slime wrapped around and mauled the shaft from her grip. The pristine metal was guzzled by a swashing crypt below.

"For Niddler! And all monkeybirds!" The authoritative screech of a gracious avian dispatched. The insurmountable bevy of feathered primates glided into the combat zone with spears and other makeshift rods.

"Queen! We can't fight them, we have to retreat or we'll drop like flies!" The airborne monkeybird sought the attention of the lavender royalty.

"He's right, Aysha!" Zena forewarned with a lance in mitts, sailing for the prominent matriarch-bird.

"Very well, but we must find a way to help these brave heroes!" Aysha consented to depart, followed by the vibrant formation.

"For Queen Aysha and the Future Mother of Us All!" All the monkeybirds chanted and withdrew.

"Captain Norga, can you find a spot of weakness? Delpha formation!" Queen Malu ordered in the heat of attack.

"We will find their weak points and invade from there!" Avagon compelled the rest of her company. Ella blew the conch to signal a blitz offensive.

"No Avagon, wait for our dual talents to act! We can only annex the Surge!" From across the band, Teron defined. Avagon swiftly conjoined a gesture of agreement.

"You'll both pay for what you did to your own people! And you, Bloth, Destroyer of lands..." Ren gritted with aversion, he loosely arrested his blade. The flare of vanquishing triumph continued.

"Insolent Son of Primus, I was controlling Bloth and Mantus from day one! Imagine what I will do with this one if you do not give up those Treasures!" The overbearing wave harrowed, taunting Ren's motivation.

"No you weren't, you only influenced them! The choice was theirs, they chose to be evil. Now they'll pay for what they've done!" Ren boomed with a voracious temper. Frustrated and overcome, he sparsely guarded his standing plot alone. Downcast pupils palpitated.

"Ren! Go to the lighthouse! Go to the lighthouse, Ren!" Jenna imposed to Ren, she wished she could hug the boy. She pushed him onward. "The Treasure chamber!" She goad out. The opaque wisp of moisture began to worm a striving path up to the ankle of the grief-stricken adventurer. The dark water deluged over a curved luminescence.

"I'll be thrown to Caverns of Eight Evil Plagues!" Without a clue of motion except for the silt-shattering eruption, the serving form Bloth's Shadow had been bowled over on the side. With a machete submerged in jet mud the black-veined radical instantly recovered a placement on nimble legs. Dark Disciple Mantus grasped his own head before again sniping for unprepared Ren. The darkened ex-commander took another plunge.

"Konk is full of surprises!" Konk hobbled by with a cheering acclaim, fetching his boomeranged appendage and skedaddling away from the soon-to-be-interlocking enemies.

"I'll cut you to pieces, Ioz!" The reborn cutthroat struck forward with a blinding assault at the interrupter, a vicious wail murdering sanctity.

"Rot in guuda-bay, Mantus!" Ioz delivered with uninhibited furor, with one cut he aimed for the eye-socket in the bottling skull.

"Ioz, wait!" Ren jumped away with an apprehension, awaiting catastrophic impact.

"You sick son of a se-Ay...chungo!" Ioz hissed with a maimed throttle. The tip stopped a fragment before. He yowled with a tear-streaked gaze. He inhaled after the boot and the crunching pop that ravaged his senses. Then he clobbered the dirt after the plowing sole, his trunk thwarted.

"Attack him!" Queen Malu commanded her armed forces of warriors on Tarnda. They began to advance with the armored creatures, shooting darts at Dark Mantus.

"I'll be glad to pay you back Ioz! If this is the end of my fighting days, then what a way to go! Let's go Mantus, whaddaya say you and me have one last bar-brawl? You're not cheating this round, commendable skip!" Zoolie vaulted around Malu and Norga with a bouncing step and a challenge of fatality. The commander of shade eagerly launched forward with a guttural yell. He briefly curled to nearby Ren. "Kayrn didn't have a happy ending to her tale, but Tula is going to have one for her's." The red-haired man chivalrously exchanged with Ren, the two men issued dual nods. Ren readied to draw the Sword of Primus as Zoolie baited for the crazed disciple. The demonic Mantus screeched with a harried throe.

"No payback is needed!" Heads turned at the almost-cruel exhibition. With a tortured howl, Disciple Mantus had been hoisted into the sky while being strangled by the disabling lightning. Legs and arms of blue twitched, flailing helplessly in the wind. The stream of energy spun the monstrous consort around before dropping. The infuriated ecomancer impelled forward, carrying a close-to-malicious stare. "You want another chance, coward?! Bow!" The Andorian beauty grilled under a bite steeping with unrestrained rage, lashing out her arm to the opponent's straight jaw.

"Please, wench...!" The terrified black-blood begged on his knees.

"You didn't see me coming, did you? This is for all the tricks you pulled! My name is Tula!" Tula pronounced at the swordsman distracted by his own fear after a dash of pink. She removed the Sword from Ren's aspiring arms and slashed the tank from the flimsy fiend's neck, dealing the finishing blow and killing Dark Mantus on the spot.

"How in the-" Zoolie swaggered two paces backward, throughly overwhelmed as purple mist hued the atmosphere.

"Amazing woman!" Ioz blissfully recited while comforting his sides, he ogled with eyes after gathering enough vigor to lean up.

"What about Tula?" Tula stomped to the bosom buddies, with a fierce inquest. "I wasn't too rough, was I boys?" Tula pondered with a nervy stamina.

"No...!" Zoolie radiantly stuttered.

"Ioz, stay out of this." Tula choppily directed, plunking a dragonbow at Ioz's seated position. Taking one glance at his state, she hurriedly bounded off for Ren at the front-line.

"Ren is one lucky seadog." Zoolie slipped in a belated response.

"And how." Ioz concurred. He pulled back the immense string and aimed from the dirt.

"Am I late?" Few lengths back from where Tula performed her overtaking enchantment, a cultured summon sought a truthful assessment. Salamantha adjourned her fingertips from the spell.

"You're right on time." Teron skipped a nod over to the dignified daughter with his pleased agreement.

"Ren, tell them to stop or I will destroy the last of your ancestry!" The fanatical Bloth wangled with a desperate bluff as his gawk fazed at the dark believer being taken out. In his preoccupation, he failed to pay mind to the uprise of a league to the rear. Ren tussled with the suffused sentiments.

"No!" Jenna opposed.

"Hard to do, Bloth..." The friendly sound splashed with a tap on the shoulder. "When ye don't have a sword!" Zoolie buoyantly greeted the prodigious hellion with a smirk, he threw his only weapon in the opposite direction. He juggled the sleek cutlass belonging to the ruined Mantus and cast it at the center of Bloth's slicer, piking it too far behind.

"This is for our father!" From the back recesses, Solia shrilled forward with a half-furnished drum of gooey Surge-murk. The mutilated smithereens clumped over the Dark Agent. Disciple Bloth tripped, still in retention of the keeper.

"No, Bloth! You're washed up! You've lost your beast, your ship, and now you've lost your soul!" Ren declared a finishing resolution as he stabbed the Sword of Primus at the former enemy's heart. He screamed as his igniting fuel took down the rest of the dark disciples. "No!" Ren sizzled, eyes were fixed on an ebony bird shielding his passing point. The obscure chimera lent an edge of an aqua-toned mineral to the possessed monster before becoming lilac dust.

"You always knew how to make an exit, boy. Take one more step, Son of Primus, and I promise she will die a merciless death. This is your last chance, surrender to Master!" Dark Disciple Bloth threatened at Jenna's ransom. Tula terminated her movement, the lighthouse guardian had been softened by a stifling and lurid embrace. The surrogate awaited dismay.

"Go now! Only confront Kerroputus!" Avagon issued a brunt order, declaring an all-out invasion. Conscripts ridged the berm and began to tear at the wall of the obsidian-blooded mutant. The extremist beast whirled and slung back into the gaping rush at poles and prods. Chilly smut produced from the defensive line, but was unable to do any harm to those under the protection of the beacon.

"Now is the time!" Zena called out from a flock of feathered-fighters. Queen Aysha decreed her people to partake in the blitz. Spears and rods pounded the walloping detestation.

"Commander Artifice of Airforce Division Six here, ready to engage barrage on Three...Two...One." Metal wing-guards braced monkeybird wings of maroon and chrome as a proud parent sailed through the thick air and dropped coordinates with a click of his plated beak. The tailless avian granted one wise salute and glided among the frontlines.

"Fire! Don't give them a moment's rest, pronto!" Captain Norga lambasted from a hollow of crustacean-riders. Flaming arrows perforated the skies of misery, launched at the macabre dragon.

"Mak Toi! Everyone! For our world and countries plagued by this scourge! Don't let a single creature fall!" Saytasi screamed as she bludgeoned forward the most stupendous dagron-fleet on all of Mer. She merely brandished a crude shank. Valjen raiders and pilots of all races blew with her, flapping of sturdy wings made a marvelous sound over the deathly terrain. Leviathans arose in the distance, pitching out of the murk to chomp a multitude of revolting volley.

"Fire!" King Obrik applied to the Antari spearmen at his dispatch, projectiles were launched and catapults fired. Tor and Scon fighters charged the weapons. Kree soldiers lined the passage, propelling scythes and other return trajectories.

"No, go away!" Kerroptus hissed from his scathing incisor, dodging the barrage that prolonged unceasingly from the restricted landlot. Monkeybirds and dagrons spiraled around him. Then, all the species congregated in one immeasurable band. Power and might from far and wide synchronized in a cloak of scales and feathers. The winged beasts hoisted Kerroptus from her location and dragged her into oceans of dimness. He sunk, ingested by the underworld.

"You said you would let her go!" The outraged Ren yelled, he bit with a forsaken expectancy. He watched the undoing before his gaze, hands now free. The tavernowner's swipe collided with a degenerate orb at the instant of the exchange of the Gems. Below the powder of violet floating in the wind hung an aquamarine sword fashioned from pure Ruukaana, it sunk as quickly as the once-proud nanny of the Grace of Octopon.

"How easily you are deceived, Son of Primus! The Dark Dweller does not keep his promises! My lack of mercy is unconditional, unlike some fools! But don't fear, you will be joining her shortly!" The inebriated essence sinfully cackled. The Dark Dweller advanced forward to delve the vulnerable prince into wallowing mass.

Ren backed away. He carried the 12th Treasure of Rule within a clenched palm. In his destitute rumination, he examined the flawless surface. Very impeccable, not a scratch mark or skid could he behold. Though, such an elegant carving could have surely competed, were it not for the generous Spirit flickering like a luminary. He remembered wondering at the time why a professional schemer like Mantus would simply let him take the valuable Treasure with no observation, without knowing what he does now. "No, Dark Dweller. You are the one easily deceived! That Treasure I handed you was a decoy! You can thank Bloth for that." Ren propelled an ingenious pitch. Undaunted, he smirked.

"What? You tricked me! You will pay!" The hateful duress arose to smother Ren. The murkiness wrapped a veil around the heir, who did not show any indication of retreat. The Dark Dweller lurched. "What, what's wrong! I'm terrible!" The omnipotent core pulsated with fury, but the sound began to tear.

"What's the matter, Dark Dweller? Don't tell me you're sick. You were just about to take over Mer and destroy me." The resourceful Ren justly motivated, his expression callously immersed.

"Too much of Mer is under my control, but for nothing! The pain! Stop the pain!" The Dark Dweller writhed with a harrowing sorrow.

"Well I can't do anything to save you, I just have one Treasure, you have the rest." Ren casually said.

"I can see myself with these Treasures inside me, it hurts! The powers of good are unattainable to me...and I can't win! I've destroyed myself! Noooo!" The Dark Dweller bemoaned with regret, unable to handle the exclusive view of his own gloom. He simmered in remorse of the object in the duo mirrors of Crown and Sword. The shaved replica forged from a distinct jug of ale, and contrived by a lost conman, did no justice to the disconsolate tyrant.

Because Avadasia in her Miragonese body was jealous of Kauldron's magic so much that she tried to drown him, and when that failed she banished him to Andorus where he met your true mother, Supreme Ecomancer Sugii. Long times he spent looking for her after you were born, but never did he find her. Supreme Ecomancer Sugii and the warlock Kaldron adopted you to the parents who raised you, Tulina, because they wanted you to learn how to fight for yourself. Being only a magician and an ecomancer, they could not train you as a warrior themselves. I stood in the path of Kauldron and Sugii when they would be taken by Bloth. Even as I sought to return you to your true parents I was given no lesser choice than to use a trick, for my ecomantic abilities are weak in might and far less valuable. Though Sugii tried to save you from being captured with me, even her powers were hampered by the Blight. You Tulina, will surpass Sugii in prowess, even without the unexpected transformation to a mighty ecomancer granted by the trials of your youth.

"Now, Tula!" Teron, fronting a massive legion of Andorians, urged the prize pupil of the assembly.

"Now let's show our beauty to all of Mer! We're taking back our beautiful world!" Tula exquisitely called to action the entirety of her home, she ascended a sublime light into the sky. Teron and her own family radiated with the richness of every lifegiving source from the planet. Images of flora and pouring blue flashed in the horizon. Tula, with Teron's compelling push, sparked her energy through the sodden sleaze to kindle the blazing Sword within. The combination of the rupturing fire exploded in an excitement of static and combustion from the epicenter. The Dark Dweller did not weep to his death.

Ren boarded the dagron out of the explosion. He remembered Jazhea when she showed him how to fly, Avagon and all his teachers were pleasant reminders of who he was. He used a heart of confidence to tail on the bramble forward and through all the lessons on his timeless Quest, the growing youth found out who he was going to be.

Thirteen spirits and values placed their hands into each dent on the opening floor surrounding the lighthouse. The prince stepped the depths into the beacon of the planet. Using the Sword of Primus, he entered the Treasure chamber. The force of Mer's life flowed into his quintessence. The mystic Relics flew from him and connected to the Thirteen windowpanels in the room, forming an outstanding beam of light that consumed him and flooded into all corners of the world.

"You have done well, my Son!" Ren discerned the praising face of his father through every part of his mind. The vision ignited with a flame, then it stopped.

The 13th Treasure of Rule was placed among the hair of the golden ascendant, it resembled a more appropriate crown in it's state of fullness. The dignified and powerful Sword of Primus was at his side, and to stay with him. Ren lay in the most ancient and secret chamber of the lighthouse of rule for a long while. His blue eyes opened, then closed.

There was a darkness, then there was a light.

"Ren, you did it!" Ren opened his eyes and he could not see, he envisioned he heard someone calling to him. Then he realized, he was being hugged.

"You did it, buddy! You saved Mer...Noy jitat if someone told me, I never would've believed it!" Another voice scampered as Ren's sight came into focus. "Chungo lungo! Not the ribs you gaada wom-ow! Ow!" The same man revolted as a receding sigh sounded from the one who backed away.

"Ioz? Tula?" Ren started to ask, he pried eyes on a shirtless explorer and a rosy paragon. Then he was embraced.

"About time you woke up." The noise from a familiar avian also met Ren's ears. It squawked. "I'm hungry!" He complained.

"Niddler!" Ren shouted endearingly, greeted by a mass of feathers. "How did you get out, I thought-" He floundered with elation, trying to recollect.

"You don't think the Treasures did nothing, do you? Flying in front of things is useful sometimes." The monkeybird clarified.

"It only took a drop of a potion, and only a drop of courage." Tula smiled as she petted a fluffy head, affectionately congratulating as the simian cooed.

"Jenna insisted we couldn't eat until you woke up." Niddler casually prattled of an assumed feast. Hurriedly, he fidgeted to rouse his companion.

"Jenna too?! What happened?" Ren inquired of the close friends, who were gathered around. He was strewn on a rolled-out bed, his head felt funny.

"You saved Mer, Ren! The dark water is gone for good!" Tula energetically proclaimed. She wore the happiest smile Ren had seen on her face, and it made him smile too. Ioz and Tula carefully pulled Ren up from his resting spot, with a little help from Niddler. They guided the regent to the balcony of the palace where he was lodged. Through the bright open skies, nothing but crisp air of salty-sea could be seen over the clean water.

"Quite an inspiration, isn't it?" Ioz gleaned with wit, giving Ren a wink. Ren returned a grin.

"The dark water is really all gone! I can go back to Andorus again soon! I've missed so many people!" Tula made a joyful wish, tears in her eyes. She squeezed Ren, who cherished her closely. Ioz only smiled.

"Oh my! You're awake, Ren!" The four friends subverted to gape at the manner of welcoming that entered the room. Jenna stood in the doorway.

"Jenna!" Ren vivaciously greeted his guardian, he hustled forward to bestow on her a hearty hug.

"The people of Octopon and Mer are very proud." Jenna beamed as she warmly congratulated her nephew and now savior of Mer. "Later I'll show you around the palace, I have not been in this place in so long that I've forgotten how big it is." Jenna mused with a quaint inflection. She paused to peer about the room at the many and very fine details of the regal decor that still stood in the original state.

Ren dreamed as everything started to come back to him now, he was going to be King. He was older since he began the Quest, it now felt like so long ago, and he had only finished. So much he had grown intellectually in that small amount of time. So many thoughts rushed through his head all at once, he was not used to this stagnation. The idea of not having to run through caves for Treasures nor watch his back. Not having to protect his comrades at the price of his life, or to run away and worry about Bloth coming to kill him. It seemed surreal, like becoming used to running barefoot on rocks and then only treading over pillows. He became lost in his mind.

"You told me we'd eat when Ren woke up!" Niddler insisted yet again.

"I did, didn't I, Niddler?" Jenna laughed genially. "Of course we will go to dinner!" Jenna gleamed and led the way. "I hope you like the best fare in all of Octopon!" She prided with a jolly parade to the hall when she warned the half-starved heroes of the bountiful feast that would be awaiting them.

Dinner was the most delicious and decadent meal the questmates had ever tasted, Niddler had scoffed down so many minga-melons, janda-cakes and puuka-luuka pies that he would be heavy for the next week and a half. Ren's coronation was discussed and was planned for the coming weeks. Jenna and some aides of the throne would soon tutor him in his role. After Ren and his guests dined at the palace and before their beds were drawn, Teron told them some interesting lore.

"The Treasures of Rule, if they did indeed become the property of a dark master would become corrupted." The ancient ecomancer spoke about the jewels of Mer. "If Bloth had used the 9th Treasure to his advantage, it would have destroyed Ren because the Treasure was bound to his soul, similar to what the dark water would have done." The wise chieftain continued. "Though Bloth did have the cruelty and tenacity to corrupt the Treasures of Rule, he did not have the spirit or the drive to do so." He knowledgeably explained, to which his audience turned a peculiar eye at.

"Wait, I thought that was all he wanted to do. All he ever did was try to get the Treasures for himself without thinking of anything else." Tula added with relevance, baffled at Teron's unclear words.

"That's exactly right, my child. It is because he thought of nothing Good that he failed. He was impatient and ruthless with his encounters, not at all calculating or introspective, but most of all, he never believed he could find what he was searching for and was unable to find any Treasures on his own. If he had, perhaps he would garnered a better favor to the world. It is fortunate, otherwise our world as we know it may have been lost for good." Teron construed with a lucid responsibility as he got up to inspect a globe in the living quarters. "The thirteen virtues and the Spirit of Mer itself. Since creation the Treasures draw to each other and are bound by Ecomancy, the Healing. The true River of Rule lies within Ren himself all along and you, embodied with The Spirit to save Mer and reform everything destroyed." Teron discoursed as he smiled at the new King. Ren's friends inclined a glance at the heir.

"The Dark Dweller panicked when he realized Ren would soon assume this power. He succeeded in using Bloth for his end to try to destroy what he could not, if only for a short time but the Dark Water cannot find humanity." Teron sensibly shared.

"Grandfather, what about this? It was given to me by cousin before she went away...supposedly it has protective powers. So I was told, it has rare abilities like the Compass of Rule. Is it true? Could be...another Treasure of Rule?" Jazhea came forward with a curious puzzlement. She handed an aquamarine amulet to the elder.

"This? You received this thirteen years ago. This is pure Ruukaana, I'm positive. Most often found in Northern seas. I believe your father journeyed there with his most loyal confidant before he activated the Quest. Kuunda knows what knowledge the King and his brother Mizar possessed from that island's reaches, I was one of the few who knew of the hidden kinship that made them quite an enterprising team. I do not even believe Phorlock knows the Compass was found in the River of the North Pole of Mer, but the Compass of Rule did hide a marvelous potency upon being unveiled. Mizar was actually the one to speculate immediately after he had found the artifact and he said it was a mere error when he tried to reclaim his old compass he had lost in the Northern River of Toishuok. Had we known earlier that the 13th Treasure of Rule could not be properly used without the Compass, we would have been at least a step ahead in our original campaign. Pure Ruukaana, very rare metal. No Treasure of Rule, I'm afraid." Teron exceptionally revealed, after appraising the sage sediment.

"Then how-" Jazhea expressed astonishment.

"That confidence was yours. Keep it safe." With a smile Teron softly pitched.

"I thought I was the only one Taneuka gave this to!" Ioz acclaimed with a wild stare, he inspected his own neck ornament.

"It was, Kayraadin!" Ren exacted with revelation.

"Sometimes the biggest threats can come from the smallest sources." Iskjar wisely harmonized.

"Teron." Tula began to verge out. "What I don't understand is how I could have sensed Ren from so far away when he was in danger." She verbalized her confusion.

"I think you already know the answer to that, young one. You are the element of Nature, you have helped Ren realize his potential. Ever since you took it upon yourself to use your ecomantic powers to save him in the Dark Dweller's lair and forge the Sword of Primus to it's former greatness. Without your help, Ren could not have succeeded. The lost virtues of Love and Kindness only come from the heart." Teron gracefully affirmed, beaming sensitively at Tula as she gazed at Ren, who consequently stared back at her. Their eyes met for a spectacular moment in time until another voice called from outside the room.

"It's time for you all to sleep now! Ren has a very big day tomorrow!" Jenna beckoned to them as they got up, bidding farewell to Teron for the night.

When the sun rose in the morning, the quartet of adventures gathered around the shoreline to pore over the endless expanse of vibrant blue seas.

"It's so peaceful now that the dark water is gone." Ren observed with admiration at the sight. Tula smiled at him.

"Should be great for sailing! And Treasure hunting..." Ioz slyly conjured with a grin, the others laughed.

"So soon?" With a tease Tula challenged him. She awed as a previous sapling from the ground began to creep up the side of her leg, it greeted her and dropped a fruit into her palm. The harvest she granted to Niddler.

"Why not? The dark water is gone! Our crew has been all around Mer, finding some normal treasure will be a piece of kleepa-cake!" Ioz excitedly declared, brewing a clever smirk. By Ren's side Niddler ruffled his feathers.

"You're still healing up!" Niddler sagacious chimed, motioning to the bandages. "It was nice being able to see my brothers from Pandaawa and Artifice again, I haven't seen them since I was a young fledgling." Niddler chirped and reflected, munching the reaping. "Life is better when anyone can be brave!" He laughingly cawed, sweeping his colorful wings into the sweet air.

"I guess this really is the start of the rest of our lives now. I couldn't have done it without you, and everyone." Ren expressed with a promising grin as he joined in a group embrace. "There are so many other parts of Mer that still need to be renewed, Octopon and Kalinda. Andorus..." Ren started to drone on after he mentioned Tula's homeland. There was a splash and a noise coming from the water and Ren twisted his head around. "What was that?" He visually probed, examining for the source of the sputter.

Out of the water and away from the friends, a fish-tailed princess arose from the crystal waters off the quarry. Adea waved to Ren. Emerging from underneath, a gargantuan serpent swept her off her fin. Baby bellowed.

Ren did not know what to think of the saetail woman he remembered. She just flagged him, even beamed at the toned woman nearby and she seemed to be happy. She plunged down into the water, giving one last salute. He wondered how her people were doing now. "Goodbye!" Ren called out suddenly as the form disappeared and Baby roared a hopeful adieu. His claret cheeks livened.

"What was that about, Ren?" Ioz was obscurely perplexed at Ren's odd reaction.

Ren surmised and finally speculated. "I don't know. I guess everything really is right. Like you and me, Tula." He merrily gestured to both of his friends and he cradled his arm around the ecomancer-beauty, the pirate secured a brotherly palm on the nobleman's steady back. Avian feathers dusted the beach. Blossoms from newly-planted trees were in full, shrubbery donned the landscape. The four bonded friends watched out at the vast expanse of purified ocean from the shore of a city called Octopon.

Deep below the waters of a planet called Mer, an ancient being lay where unheard noises prevailed.

"How old are you now? In years?" The strained voice attempted to speak to another lifeform within the tiny realm of black that was sealed from the outside world.

The other creature paused as if he needed to think momentarily before answering this query. "204." The beastly presence counseled at last, after much ponder.

"You will live much longer before you are through." The hiss of the void rebounded once more.

"What do you mean by this?" The treacherous sound of the bicentennial inhabitant inquired.

"My powers grow weak, I do not have enough darkness left to prolong me." The feeble gloom who informed the opposite existent in the chamber rasped, it had come to be only three times as massive than the audience in size. Only a faint scarlet glow of a face remained. "None have been able to bring down the House of Primus! The Guardians of ancient resistant powers, the Treasures that lay below the city of Octopon...will always be entrusted to it's heirs of the throne. You, Evil flows through your blood as if it is essential for your lifeforce. You of all have come the closest to wiping out the Royal line of Primus. My predecessor failed and the one before him did not even come close to what you have attained! Of all the Pirates of Dark water, you have succeeded the most. You will take my place and carry on the legacy of the dark water that has existed since Mer began..." The abysmal abrasion droned out.

The other figure listened and watched the ominous being encircle and point itself at his face to continue. "Yes?" The servant asked.

"However, if you cannot defeat the House of Primus, and all of it's remaining successors, your end will be a slow one as mine. You will never be freed from this planet, and eventually the energy of the jewels will completely dissolve any substance that remains of you over time, and the dark water that comprises your life will permanently disappear. The longer you are unable to break free, the weaker your powers become." The Master of pure Evil pronounced with a knowledgeable twist, coiling around the specter below him with a remnant of strength. "Now, the time has come. My dominion becomes yours, my new Master." The Dark Dweller's proclamation faded into nothing in the Abyss as a new King, long awaited, took his place.


	18. Resolution

Epilogue

RESOLUTION

The chatter of the bar was becoming loud, the young captain's thoughts were clumping into one.

"So, how have you been keeping busy old buddy, good friend the King." Ren peeked at the smiling longterm of his sitting across from him in the tavern, the apprentice delayed to answer.

"It's not all that exciting, just dealing with all the needs of the city." Ren conveyed a plain and honest answer. "Occasionally I get leisure time, a big priority now is getting all the refugees from Andorus on their feet again." The King of twenty genially relayed. He pivoted a glance to the woman next to him, who looked like she wanted to add something.

"It's been a hard day!" The raven-maned Tula started to complain, downing a sip of ale as she sat at the table. "Hasn't it been Ren?" She watched the buddy next to her and smiled momentarily, seeking response. "It's been a stressor but I'm going to stay a few weeks back home, then I'll have some leisure time." The green-eyed Andorian gleamed happily as they touched base.

"Kalinda?" The red-head, who ambled to the table next to a ebony buccaneer jabbed him in the arm. The swart fellow scooted over and displayed a fake smirk as if he was going to punch back. The two shot scowls at each other, then smiled and sat down.

"Kalinda is...up and running fine." Ren's teal eyes flashed at the ridiculous antics of the long-time friends and then continued to relate. "Actually it was the town that responded to restoration efforts the best." Ren could not help but delight in this. Only three years passed since he had taken the throne but by far, he accomplished so much under his reign.

"Well I think they could use some more entertainment! I haven't been in one Kalinda tavern longer than it took to get a pint! Their gamehouses are as stale as a loaf of barnacle-bread!" Zoolie chuckled and Ioz joined him in an understanding laugh.

"That's...not really our goal but we are trying to get them to lift their ban on monkeybirds." The youthful King of Octopon defined with a pause.

"Speaking of monkeybirds, where's your flying friend, Niddler? I thought he would be at his Majesty's palace enjoying the galley...and eating you out of house and Kingdom!" The tavernman joked, inquiring about the missing member of the group.

"Visiting his nestmates on Pandaawa." Tula naturally stated.

"Really eh? Having little flying meloneaters of 'is own?" The flame-haired pal meddled in return.

"Monkeybirds don't lay eggs except for the Queen, Zoolie!" Ioz reverted to the barman to correct him. "Where has your head been, Janda-town?" He suggested with quip.

"Actually, yes." Zoolie confessed, rather flatly. "'Ey Ioz, here's something ye might like to know. I could have sworn on my beard I saw Taneuka in Janda-town." He colorfully informed.

"By mist of Malaagar! Ay chipungo, no smilge?" Ioz promptly arced his wowed attention.

"Aye, that's a denbar-tale to what Maars recently told me. Said at some point my wealthy Old' man used to know a noblelady from Octopon. Said she was quite wild about Ren's too. Er, more like puuka-eyed, fore over aft if you catch me drift. I used to think it was just me and Soosoo, other than him." Zoolie shushed the discreet hint.

"No kidding." Ioz hesitated for a while before his mouth formed words. "Too bad her royal venture didn't work out. I don't suppose she was interested in the greatest blacksmith in Ebron. Not when there's a King to compete with." He muffled his pitch and prodded eyes opposite.

"You got it, chum." The outgoing patron earnestly ended with a bite of ale.

"So do I, have your blessing, future brother?" Ioz agilely requested.

"Why would ye need to ask? Course'. But you'll have to earn every reef in five year's time, I'll have no sea-leeching in-laws." Zoolie duly applied his limits.

"Oh come on, brother." Ioz warmheartedly bickered.

"Ye ask me why I don't leave Janda-town." Zoolie swiftly deemed. He pondered for a moment and then shifted back to the King and the ecomancer. "Speaking of the Queen, has Your Majesty given any thought to getting one of 'is own?" The red-haired man cleverly suggested, almost at a whisper. Ren was struck off his guard and at a loss for words, slightly embarrassed. Ioz just chuckled.

"I think Tula would like to be Queen! Wouldn't you Tula? To the Queen of Octopon!" Ioz proudly proclaimed as reveled with an open wicker that resembled a tiara, which he placed upon the ecomancer's head. He then took a swig of his ale and winked at Ren.

"What's that supposed to mean? Ioz, keep your hands to yourself and keep that chunga-lungan thing off my head!" Tula irritably shouted, fire in her nerve as she threw the weaving back at the brunet acquaintance across from her.

"Come on, Tula! I think it suits you, nothing wrong with wanting to be Queen!" Ioz kid with her playfully and replaced the mock crown back on her head. Ren knew he shouldn't but he couldn't help but laugh, albeit shyly. Ren never concerned himself with women all that much and for some reason, felt shy about the issue. Except for one woman, of course.

"Stop it Ioz!" Tula demanded as her tone maddened, she stood up and cast the basket at him. Everyone noticed the red cheeks of embarrassment flushed over her facade, even Ren.

"Easy, woman!" Ioz teased as all continued to jest and jolly, it was then when Tula endured enough and ran out of the inn through the door. She knew even the King was laughing at her, which would be a good thing, if she had not known what it meant. It was then when Ren hurried after her, Zoolie and Ioz waited a great deal of time before they followed. Ren thought their absence was intentional, and it probably was.

Ren reminisced about those days, the memories. The Quest was so long ago and it felt like some crazy dream that ran altogether. Salty air filled his nose as he dazed out, he started to come back to reality. The floor wildly rocked from under him.

"Whoa! Easy on the helm...that's it! You got it!" Ren smiled as he helped the deep-locked boy steer the very ship he crewed on foreverago to save Mer. The boat was now steadily steering off into the calm sea ahead. He was 35. He patted his oldest son on the shoulder, the firstborn but not only. To this day, Ren never understood how he managed to have twelve children, that many potential heirs to the throne of Octopon. Granted, the few initial times were multiples but he still did not think it was possible for him, or his bride.

"I think I'm going to be sick..." The feminine voice from outside the quarters softly announced. She was arresting her head, as she felt nauseous. Seasickness was not something she had experienced for a farflung time. She peeked down at her swollen belly and tried to stand up. She almost fell down before a man caught her arm.

"Whoa! Steady, woman. We don't want to lose one!" The quiescent partner lulled to the lady who had nearly slipped as he steadied her. "Of course, we have enough already, but it would be a jitatan shame to lose this one!" The friend kindly beamed at her with dark eyes. She could not keep from noticing that he called her the name he always did during those days that were so far gone, it made her feel better and she smiled. Those strong arms helped her back down.

"Would you like to rest here, Tula? I can let Niddler hold Nacuu for a while." Jenna gently offered as she hummed to the blond baby with eyes of emerald that she nestled in her arms, one dear to her as a very own grandchild.

"Thanks Jenna, I'll be alright." Tula peacefully assured as she sat on the deck, her mood unable to savor much.

"We'll dock soon." Ren bent a head from the wheel of where his eldest son poised and smiled at the woman he cared about more than any other on Mer.

"How is Zena, Niddler?" The fellow of graying charcoal now addressed the monkeybird on the ship as he stayed at the sickly companion's side and for the lack of anything else to do.

"Oh, I didn't know you were there, Ioz." The startled monkeybird swayed around at the stable pirate speaking to him. "She's on the nest, as usual." Niddler, who was starting to retain more greatly-patched white around his eyebrows, lackadaisically said.

"She let you out to spread your wings, eh?" The advanced sailor quietly jested.

"Actually, I think she was quite happy to be rid of me." The middle-aged monkeybird pronounced with a tad indignation.

"Being a mother will do that to a woman, Niddler." Tula sighed delicately as she gave her winged friend of old an understanding grin.

"How is Solia, Ioz?" Niddler plied the seafarer about his family in return.

"Met some shady sea-bum in Janda-town when we were there last." The disgruntled Ioz answered with a frankness. "Zoolie and Jazhea thought it was jitatan hillarious." He grumbled out.

"You don't approve, do you?" Niddler cleverly inquired.

"Not on your life!" Ioz remarked with an aggravated growl.

"How is that old gaming house, Ioz? Unfortunately I haven't visited there in forever. Is sis still helping with the management?" Ren urged his old friend to elaborate.

"'Far as I know. I was there only a few months ago. Played a few rounds with Zoolie but she set off to gather supplies as soon as I arrived. Dagrons are hard to feed I suppose. Especially ones that work for their meal." Ioz laughed reflectively.

"Sounds like his new mascot is keeping him in business. Jazhea, ugh, I can't stand to see her again or I would still hit her for that dangerous stunt she pulled." Tula smartly commented. Ioz cleared his throat.

The passengers of the Wraith continued to chew the sea-cud until they heard shouts coming from astern. Turning a glance, they all saw a small dinghy with two boaters, both missing at least one leg and one of them missing an arm. With them was another figure that was almost unrecognizable.

Ren's eyes lit up as he witnessed the character he recognized. "Look, it's Konk!" The father beckoned with a hearty laugh.

"And he has a friend with him!" Ioz's melody became one of grand amusement. He bellowed at the skinny cretin-head, who now employed two metal legs and a synthetic arm to boot. "How is it going, Joat? You should call your yacht the S.S. Constrictus!" Ioz hollered out a fanciful taunt to the former owner of the Wraith as the piddling skiff struggled to keep pace, but was failing to catch up. Then he noticed the third accomplice on the boat, Niddler did too.

"Love the new look, Yellow-Wing!" Niddler flapped up in a jeer from his previous resting at the other monkeybird he observed on the ship.

From the dinghy, a completely-balded monkeybird gnarled at the crew of the Wraith. Yellow-Wing was unable to fly at the subject of his ire.

"I'll get you yet, Ioz!" Joat's scream traveled to the board of the red schooner from afar. The group on the maroon clipper envisioned they saw him throw his hat off his scalp and kick and bray at the pegleg with him, who in turn argued back for once and did not take any lip from the metal-limbed.

"Now this is the kind of adventure I live for!" Ioz yelled back with overt enjoyment. He filled his airways with the placid seabreeze.

Ren laughed. "You should really give it back to him someday, Ioz." From the helm the light-hearted King playfully joked.

"Chungo lungo! And spoil all this fun?" Ioz elatedly chuckled. "Maybe if I ever decide to wear a ball and chain like you, Ren." The black-haired buccaneer joshed with wit.

"You know you would make Taneuka your deck-wife if you were given the opportunity." Tula hastily joined in. Ioz didn't contend.

"You're lucky you don't have so much responsibility, Ioz." Ren almost made merry, but he returned the mention seriously. Although the Royal servants of Octopon assisted in caring for his many heirs, he still led a structured life in his Kingdom.

"Nah, you're the lucky one, Ren." Ioz earnestly reflected, with dusky eyes he quaintly smiled at his long time seamate. He watched Tula, who was over by Jenna and now tending to baby Nacuu with a mother's love. Ren understood after all this time.

"Now boys, don't bicker." Jenna engaged with a warm delight. "You're bringing back memories of my own ceremony now!" She gleamed as she cherished the child, now quiet with thought.

"Do you mean you once were married, Jenna? I never knew that." Tula wondered of her wiser audience as she crooned to her baby.

"A long time ago, yes. I was a looker in my day." The crimson-haired keeper lightly curled. "I was never able to have a child of my own before I took in Ren." She softly refined.

"Didn't you ever want to be a mother?" Tula calmly asked the other woman.

"I did, but that was so long ago." Jenna beamed as she cradled the baby girl in her arms, being one of the primary caretakers of the Royal family of Octopon meant she enjoyed as much interaction with the children of the throne she helped raise as the parents themselves. She was as happy as she could be.

"Father, look! I think I see something over there! It's shinning!" Ren's fourteen-year-old son, Andor, pointed from the helm to a glimmering spot in the distance.

"Andor, don't get carried away, you still need to show me what you've been practicing when we get back to the palace." The Queen told her son as she peered up from her reading.

"I can't even move a leaf!" Andor protested at his mother's order, he still wished to sail on.

"That's why you need more practice." Andor's mother conveyed with a sharp smile. She unrolled a page in a handwritten manuscript.

"Are you still reading my father's notes, Tula?" King Ren snooped of the Queen with a grin. He saw the massive scroll in her hands, titled Chronicles of Octopon.

"I couldn't help myself. It was amazing what he discovered in his time." Tula tacitly acknowledged as she continued to read.

"Blue-lips is a kreld-eating smool-brain!" The eerily repetitive sound hopped out from a barrel, awakening guttural yells.

"Oh don't give me that!" Niddler pranced forward with haunched knuckles at the dagron-tailed bird, indignantly remarking himself. The laugh from everyone aboard soon followed.

"Remember how surprised we were when Joat was actually the one to find his work. I suppose before being captured on Kalinda Mizar didn't have a very long time to search for a good spot. Good thing Konk swiped it away or who knows what would have happened. It's funny that all this time it was buried on the remains of Qui-Qua, kept secret by Bloth's two main men. He couldn't maintain his authority." Ren dutifully composed, thinking on old events.

"It does show how he endangered his own plans, Bloth and his evil commander. Corruption takes a long time to erase, like it took a long time to revive our world." Tula mused in a contemplative perspective.

"The ironic thing is they both would have gotten what they wanted if they weren't so self-centered. Ah well, it is amazing what we did so long ago. I found it especially fascinating there was more than one Riv-" The King yielded to other study. Ren was steadily steering the controls until Andor shouted out to his father again.

"Father, father! The light!" Andor outcried with exuberance, pointing into the distance.

"I think I see something now too! Let's go take a look, Andor!" Ren's eyes lit up as he incited to drive the circling craft toward the glittering speck where his son was directing. The boat rocked wildly as it spun around. Tula nearly bumped her head.

"Ren, the Quest is over, it's not seventeen years ago! We're not going through that again, let's go back!" Tula caustically argued, not feeling well. She put down the old document, no longer able to concentrate on scrutinizing it.

"Don't you want to see what's over there, Tula?" Ren sought his dearest wife with a smirk, but he would relent.

"The Queen of Octopon needs to be careful!" Niddler squawked maturely as he hugged Tula, who petted him and smiled. "I could do for some Draja-cakes too!" The monkeybird added as his beak watered from the very suggestion.

"Looks like we're outnumbered." Ren shrugged at his boy next to him, who bore blue eyes like his own. "To port then!" The King decreed as he pulled the ship in at the Queen's request, though it was his only day off. On the way there, he passed a longer cruiser governed by an old mentor and two daughters helping her.

"Ren!" Ren had been welcomed by the elder who continued to shout to him from the bridge. She never called him by His Majesty as many in Octopon did, even though in her position she should. To the side were her daughters and grandchildren, all carrying on with her at the helm. Beside the crowded visitor were four supporting figures.

"Oh, Avagon. You have guests." Ren commented with interest, his eyes trailed to a collection of forms around the matron and her kin.

"King Ren! Thank you so much for the flowers! She always did like this kind!" In gratitude, Loren called out to Ren from Avagon's transport.

"No problem, Loren! With the Treasures of Rule, it will be possible someday! It will happen someday Loren!" With a promise to return Ren shouted back in response to the hopeful, someone else started to talk to him.

"How is your sister, Ren? How are things?" Ella besought of the King who directed the humble ship.

"She's fine, she lives with an old friend of mine! Konk has served his time cleaning the palace. Strand and the rest of the loyalists are in prison, they'll be there for a very long time." Ren answered back with preservation to his distinctive aunt.

"Building anchors." Tula joined in with a smile.

"Wait, is that, Mizar?" The King focused on the hardly recognizable silhouette of the aide.

"Aye, it's me, your Majesty." The sagely spectator greeted with a smile. "After Loren found me I was able to return home to Ella." Mizar accounted as he reached an arm around Ella's pose, he happily motioned to her.

"Father, I still feel horrible about what I did." Loren began to express. "I shouldn't have..." He chattered on before being interrupted.

"It's not your fault, Loren. It was mine. It had been so many years since she sent the letter to let me know she finally talked the commander into letting your father go and they would be returning home soon. I thought my responsibilities to the Royal family were through. I shouldn't have gone alone for your father and sister. I left an inheritance and a note to Jazhea to let her know where I was going, but she was grown. Instead I only put everyone in danger." Ella mournfully rambled.

"No, Mother. I shouldn't have been so impulsive. I intended to give the note back to Jazhea during her time of instruction and went looking for you all. Instead I only I lost it overboard when I rushed out into the tide and I didn't think I would be lost at sea in pursuit of where I believed our family may have been. I couldn't find anyone, I eventually gave up hope and set out to look into father's notes but I didn't think I would find the map where Mizar had kept it safe. Saytai is more of savior than I am, she's the one who saved father's life during his escape on the coastline of Octopon." Loren sadly reflected until Mizar laid a fatherly hand on his shoulder.

"I made the mistake of leaving Meridol and our family without warning as well." Mizar droned and sighed with a looming remorse. "You son, however, should be proud. You have thrived so much in the time I was gone and if you had not set out and given King Ren the map, who knows what state our world would be in. Though we all came upon bad fortune, we must not take what happened in the past to heart. King Ren has even said there is always a place for rebirth with a new era." The sage reassuringly gestured to his grown son.

"Yes, be proud Loren." The man from behind the three began to speak as they turned in face. "It was a great thing you did, however, the true man we should be thanking is Ren and his comrades. If he had not made the sacrifice to save our world we would not be here today. He holds his Father's courage as well as his wit. I can imagine why the thought of my pupil's boss obtaining that immaculate power that in no way could be exploited by anyone else must have been quite horrifying. Only a native could have known what the map was truly inscribed with, and my mistaken belief was that a peaceful people such as our own would have eliminated the margin for error. I have no doubt he probably remembered the location on the map for later use. In the time he was with me, he was a greedy and controlling student. This Rigel Primus knew, unfortunately I did not consider the snare of dishonesty through the Truth." Phorlock regarded of his personal disappointment.

"I shouldn't have let him provoke me into saying those words, words later used against me." From behind the gathered circle, another chary frame sauntered forward with a soft pitch.

"Saytai, you wrote to me exactly how your brother tricked you into revealing those protected inscriptions to the populace as proof even though he had already given the decree to have them released, but your beguiled words and actions sealed your resolve and mine. Lies are lies, even if through proxy, and he was lied as well. Our world would have been in decay if events had not righted themselves the way they have, that is truly a saving grace, and a lesson to all of us. Our world is no longer threatened by the plague of the dark water or the surge that helped it spread. Not anymore, and it is a fortune not to be taken for granted, nor one that will last forever." Phorlock staunchly affirmed to the rest of the group. Saytai respected him with a devoted posture as the audience nodded in concurrence.

"It's just a shame sister needed to throw herself into all this trouble, she gave us so much." Loren perspectively mused with a downcast phrase.

"I promised you I'd bring back the true Spirit of the Treasures lost by the Dark Water and the vices of chaos, and I mean it." Ren listened from the wafter below and called out above, having no indication of doubt. "You'll see her again Loren. I promise. I'll reunite, all of you." The King of Octopon avowed with steadfast boldness, he shone joyfully as he secured a strong glance overhead. The wind tossed willfully ahead of him.

"The spirits of love and kindness are already here!" Niddler cawed out after projecting into the air.

"And whatever little creature Love and Kindness have turned into now." Tula vivaciously gladdened, nourishing a laugh. "A King's promise is not to be taken lightly." She followed up with a witty statement.

"Of course, Tula. Not when Spirit and Nature conjoin." Ren tagged on her addition and brushed a sweet kiss to her cheek. Tula beamed.

"And when the dark water always vanquishes itself." The ecomancer Queen adjoined.

"It looks like you're faring well, young one!" Avagon called out from the ship beyond as the King glimpsed at her to converse a final time as he always did.

"How are things Avagon?" Ren invited a pleasant word, shouting up to his former mentor who was now the new Naval Admiral.

"Marvelous, Ren! Sea is great today, are you staying out of trouble?" Avagon's salutation yelled again as she asked what she usually did.

"You bet, Avagon!" The King acknowledged with faithfulness, the daughters and the trio of grandchildren at the old woman's side bid him a salute. So did Mizar's family and Phorlock's.

"Wonderful! I'll see you again, Ren, stay out of trouble! Always the Quest!" Avagon pumped a fist as her freighter pulled away, it's captain bid him departure like she regularly did. Ren waved a goodbye to her.

"Long life for Avagon!" Somewhere on the platform, a cheer rebounded.

"Farewell, Ren. May the seas hail to you, now and forever! Mak Toi! From the people of Qui-Qua!" Phorlock bid adieu in his personal way, Saytai smiled and signaled a demure hand. Avagon's clipper faded into the bounds.

"It's amazing she's still going." Ioz commented bluntly.

"Don't be rude, Ioz." Tula reprimanded.

"You know, I sometimes wonder if we'll ever truly find out what happened to the Imbibers since I vanished Mer of the dark water." Ren pondered as he could feel a dull sting in his focus, he rubbed his head.

"Someday Ren, someday I'm sure. You just worry about ruling Octopon." Ioz uttered with a half-stoic facade.

"We're very appreciative for what you've given us. We're glad you did, everyone is." Tula noticeably wiped a tear, thinking of old times. With a sound of a child's giggle next to her, Ren garnered a notion of hearing a second noise.

"They must be even better. I feel like I have more perception than ever before! It's amazing! Though...with a twinge every time I think about it." Ren notably revealed, his awareness drifted to a tender sensation of a ghost on his hand that tingled as if it were being touched to something else. Nearby, he witnessed the radiating image of his father in the vast skyscape.

"Of course, you did save Mer and stop Bloth and the Dark Dweller. That's what you get, no one else could have stood in those shoes the way you did. You've become a real man. We're proud of you for that, more than we could ever be. Life is sweet, my friend." Ioz bid heartfelt and plucky words to his selfless peer.

Ren swerved a turn back to port in the city of Octopon and the crew disembarked with their guests. Ren and Ioz helped a heavy-bellied Tula off of the ramp, making sure she wouldn't fall.

"I can't wait to tell mother the news! It's been a long time since I've seen her at home, it's been years since we've gone to the riverparks with all of our family. I want to see Randor in all it's splendor." Tula cheerfully wished to the King, now her husband. He gently kissed her on the cheek as she fervently grinned.

"I'm sure she'll be surprised, she likes to see her grandchildren too." Ioz parlayed his opinion.

"All three of us can go! It will be just like the old days!" King Ren suggested as the prior questmates laughed. Niddler curiously peeked up at him. "You too, Niddler!" He tagged on with a smile, frazzling the monkeybird's head feathers in a friendly gesture. Niddler fluttered upon Tula's shoulders.

"To Andorus!" The Queen of Octopon spurred with excitement, reminiscent of days passed.

"Only if Zena lets me leave the nest! I didn't have such a vacation since I was your ring-bird!" Niddler halfheartedly whined, the four of them bellowed with humor as they all walked back to the palace.

"Maybe we'll even get to search for some real treasure one of these days...until we're needed again." The die-hard swashbuckler replied with a spirited hope.

"Ioz!" From the sea where the Wraith had docked, a feminine voice called. Ioz slowly turned around.

"Chungo lungo!" The settled seafarer exclaimed when he met his attention with a familiar ship in the harbor. Ioz hollered and reciprocated a wave.

"Ioz!" There was a different woman invoking his name.

"No!" Ioz nearly howled when he saw the second patron.

"I'm just messing with you, Ioz!" Cressa winked at the stalwart pirate and chuckled as her ghost ship disappeared into the fog that was obstructing the tangible caravel. Ren fiddled with a map in his arms, an aged one.

"Thirteen Treasures of ancient time, Thirteen Lessons of Rule in rhyme. To find the jewels in secret places, Follow where the Compass faces. If returned from the shore beyond, A new day dawns for Octopon. But if they fall into evil hands, Darkness descends on all the lands. For these riches, Two shall vie. In the realm of Dark Water where the Treasures lie." Ren actively recited.

"Don't tell me you're reading that over again." Tula quickly shuffled in.

"It was translated wrong. Phorlock wrote the Quin word for imbibed, Ryaunt. I guess we've ryaont home." Ren brightly recognized, he faced the Kingdom before him.

"Hey Ren?" Niddler squawked to get his bestfriend's attention.

"Hm?" Ren responded to focus his heed upon his feathered companion. The Octopian seal on his crown glinted in the sunlight.

"What ever did happen to Commander Mantus and Captain Bloth after the dark water released everyone it held captive?" Niddler wondered with curiosity, he scurried up to his buddy.

"Well, Niddler." Ren appeared ready to say something inquisitive, it had been sudden, but he stopped an amused sound. "I suppose we'll never know." Ren shrugged and flashed his bright cerulean eyes to the monkeybird, granting a calm answer. His casting graced with a wily smile, the first one he wore in a very long time. All appeared to be well in the magnificent world of Mer.

Under the seas of Mer and deep in the darkest corner, a creature flew down from pillars in a rueful cave.

"How long..." The longing noise stewed from a beast in the doldrums.

"Well?" The semi-omnipotent voice addressed a thin creature that was similar in appearance to a demon once bound to a bell, although it bore an inky tuft and steely stones for eyes as well as wings of scale. "What do I have to contend with to rule?" The omnipresent being impatiently inquired of the much smaller and meek demon.

"Ren Primus." The flying fiend, who possessed features suspiciously like a commander of a sunken pirate ship began. "And..." The monster feared and did not want to continue for a long time. The Evil growled.

"And?" The disgruntled demand shattered with an all-encompassing doom, sensing the lifeform's hesitation.

"Thirteen heirs..." Finally, the reedy demon dolefully shuddered. The red face of the darkness shocked, and then exploded in rage.

"Wait! Don't leave! I'll be here all alone!" The blackness screamed as the monster flapped his wings.

The flying servant left his memory of a pirate's sunken skull rested by an immortal chest of 999,999,999 gold coins.

Though it was not possible, some on Mer say they could hear the defeated and agonized scream of the one-eyed Dark Dweller that day.

THE END.

"Awesome, all of it happened for real?" Three children sat in a line and whistled to the gift of a stone.

"Yes, all of it happened." The retired hero closed his nautical log from a retelling and heaved a sigh of good fortune. He lounged as he prepended the last pages of the book into their rightful order. "That jitatan Ren, Kuunda bless him." He thanked his saving grace for that last mug of amber kleepa.

"Grand-daddy Ioz, why are you laughing?" The boy with colorful eyes wished and wondered if those lids were true but those ears mightily were.

"Because it's funny what that lad did for me." Ioz chuckled like a wave mightily true and he lived with a woman, a monkeybird and the next King of Octopon.

Shortly after Taneuka had split from her engagement, Ioz ambled desolately through the graying shades of Janda-town. Never he predicted that the makings of a long-seeded past with the wild dame he had always admired was so far from him.

"It's about time a hansome pirate cared about pest-control!" The untamed buccaneer made no hearty choice but to tip out his celebratory ale when a sorrowful outcast clung to his person. "Please stay with me, there are so many things we can teach each other..." Joiquiva pled through her bulbous eyes as she clawed her ensnaring hands about the rugged navigator's midsection. "You really didn't think you were going to marry the princess, did you? Come on...I am still human after all, are you going to leave a poor insignificant damsel-in-distress like me all alone when for so long I've waited for a brave-hearted swashbuckler to rescue me from my-" Ioz shook with nerves as the abandoned weakling ceased to hack up the cadaver of a stink-beetle. "Sorry my breath is bad." Joiquiva appologetically cried and latched snuggly onto the man's thighs. Ioz yielded to another tap on the shoulder.

"I'll be glad to help you two out if you need anything extra...for a small fee." The newt directly behind the new pair slung a pair of natural tails to the flipside of her vantage as she offered her insight. "Don't worry about the future, matey, royalty isn't all it's cracked up to be. Chivalrous pirates are an endangered species, you'll be just fine." Delta sniffed a whiff of her Pufferigar and strolled back to her bungalow where the new lord awaited her return.

"Ahem." The tapping of short slippers gathered the attention of the two ladies and one man. "Brother misplaced these useless notes before he locked me away for stealing his place on the throne. I'm sure it will be of use to you." Saytai left the Chronicles of Octopon on the Wraith, when she joined the new Quest she asked for no idenity in exchange.

Mantus had been caught thieving and the townsmen had him rounded up after he revived.

"So this is what the great commander Mantus is reduced to when Bloth's not here to protect him. You should be grateful you're not dancing the hempen jig." Ioz cruelly tormented the trapped outlaw, for no reason but to flaunt.

"I'd rather be, Ioz!" Mantus rowdily endured in spitting and slamming into the bars.

"You don't know how delighted I am to hear that. Looks like the only shiny thing you'll be admiring again is your own reflection in the palace bars, sea-weasel." Ioz further provoked the prisoner covered in plain clothes.

"I don't know, Ioz, maybe we should give him a second chance. Say sorry for being rude, Mantus." Tula mocked the rough looter from his helpless oblivion.

"I'm sorry, wench!" The humiliated cutthroat glared and hissed.

"Hmph, I'll think about it." Tula walked away with Ioz, twirling the key ring. "I'm not that cruel, I'll let him out when he gets it. If, he ever does. Actually...forget that." She was emphatic as she made a byway to the hall, Ioz nodded.

"Heyy! Ren, let me go! I repented!" Mantus pleaded as he sneered and clawed to lift the lock.

"Sorry, Mantus, Tula's the only one who can sense your schemes!" Ren leapt and left, abandoning the dungeon along with his teasing taunts. The scoundrel beat fists against his bars, sadly and haplessly.

"No more predetermined destinys." In the dust a quiet stranger, perhaps the only one who felt sympathy for someone as he, turned the key.

he splattered her blood and sheathed his blade.

she repaired the wound with an excess thread and stood

"Stay behind me, at your own risk" one step in tow

nothing in the world would be found worthy of a in this lost paradise.

This concludes the only records of the reign of Z.M.Q.

From the office of

, Merr

I wrote this story based on my enjoyment of the Pirates of Dark Water show, I wrote it for myself and others. I tried to make the traits of the heroes and the villains more realistic from what I know. Anything that was frank, simple or plain in this story was probably not written by me. Please send a note and review please.

The last of my kind,


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